It was written in 1927–28 for the harpsichordist Wanda Landowska who said she "adored" playing it as it made her "insouciant and gay!"[2] Landowska was responsible for the composition of several other new pieces of music for the instrument, notably Manuel de Falla's harpsichord concerto and his El retablo de Maese Pedro (at the premiere of which, at the salon of Winnaretta Singer, Poulenc and Landowska met for the first time).
The piece alludes to music of the Baroque period, when the harpsichord was a common instrument, both in terms of its melodic and harmonic language and in its structure. It is for this reason, as well as the plain influence of Stravinsky's music of the same period, that the Concert and its slightly later companion work, the Aubade for piano and orchestra, are regarded as neoclassical compositions.[3]
A typical performance of the Concert champêtre lasts around twenty-five minutes.
Like many harpsichord works from the 20th century, this piece was written for the 'revival' Pleyelcontemporary harpsichord, with metal frame, pedals, leather plectra and heavy touch, which was prevalent at the time, rather than historic instruments from the 17th and 18th century. However, Trevor Pinnock has played and recorded it on a 3-manual Hass instrument with disposition 16' 8' 8 ' 4' 2', lute, 2 buffs, 2 couplers.[citation needed]
A recording of Poulenc himself playing the work, but on the piano, with the New York Philharmonic conducted by Dimitri Mitropoulos on 14 November 1948, was issued in 1998 as part of a 10-CD survey of historic broadcast recordings by that orchestra.[4]
^Michael Thomas Roeder, A History of the Concerto (Portland, Oregon: Amadeus Press, 1994), ISBN0931340616, citation on 362; Robert Orledge, "Satie & Les Six", in French Music Since Berlioz, edited by Richard Langham Smith and Caroline Potter, 223–48 (Ashgate Publishing, Ltd., 2006), ISBN0754602826, citation on 24.
