Barricades Mystérieuses
/The Mysterious Barricades (Les Barricades Mystérieuses) is a piece of music by François Couperin, which he composed for harpsichord in 1717. There has been much speculation on the meaning of the phrase "mysterious barricades" with no direct evidence available to back up any theory.
It is interesting to see how this very short piece of music – 3-4 minutes at most - has triggered so much interest and fascination, and how it has brought so much pleasure for over 300 years now.
Many artists have been inspired by this brief and fascinating piece for harpsichord: poets, novelists and filmmakers, such as Sofia Coppola, which used it in her film « Marie-Antoinette ». And painters as well, most famously Magritte, whose artwork « Barricades Mystérieuses » is often used to illustrate Couperin’s composition.
I first heard this piece of music in Trier, where Claude Weber was performing it… He told us the story behind it, and sure enough I also succumbed to the fascination of Couperin’s music. So, I decided to include snippets of his composition into my very own version of “Barricades Mystérieuses”.