LDV149

25 ANDRÉ ISOIR The names of François Couperin and Nicolas de Grigny are inscribed on the pediment of this classical edifice, in acknowledgment of the heights to which these two composers raised an art that is at once functional, given its liturgical dimension, and concertato, thanks to its emancipation under the diverse influences of the theatre, the aesthetics of dance, and theworld of the harpsichord. These two men – the former a link in a dynasty of artists that survived uninterrupted over three centuries, the latter a meteoric figure who died at the age of just thirty-one – were not, however, the only luminaries of this school in the final years of the Grand Siècle.