Baroque Wind Articulation à la Mode

We are less fortunate for winds in that we don’t have the selection of complete pieces that we do for string articulation. Still, the practice, as represented by three main treatises, seems to have been remarkably consistent. The three treatises, in chronological order, are:

Jean-Pierre Freillon-Poncein, La Véritable Manière d’apprendre à jouer en perfection du hautbois, de la flûte et du flageolet (Paris, 1700).

Jacques Hotteterre (le Romain), Principes de la flûte traversière… (Paris, 1707).

Johann Joachim Quantz, Versuch einer Anweisung die Flöte traversiere zu spielen (Berlin, 1752).

These were not all equally influential, of course. The Hotteterre book was reprinted eight times up to 1741, while the Freillon-Poncein book had a short life. This was probably because Hotteterre was from such a prominent family of musicians and makers. Still, it’s interesting that the practice given by Quantz resembles Freillon-Poncein, in some cases, more closely than Hotteterre. And Quantz’s tonguing charts from the first edition were still being reproduced in later editions of his treatise to the end of the 18th century, so it may be concluded that this sort of approach to wind articulation was standard, in France and Germany at least, for most of the century. Since Hotteterre and Quantz, furthermore, were internationally influential, it may be assumed that wind players in other countries, like England and perhaps even Italy, were reading them and following their precepts.

One problem in dealing with these sources is that, for all their scriptural weight, published treatises sometimes transmit mistakes, and secondary sources sometimes compound the confusion by adding to their number.  For example, Betty Bang Mather’s useful book on French woodwind technique includes at least two apparent misprints in the tonguing syllables which some players may have been interpreting as gospel for years—who knows?

Another thing that needs to be understood is that the syllables given for these articulations, mostly t and r with various vowels, include an r which is dental, as in modern Italian pronunciation, not as in modern French or English r pronunciation.

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