Description
Nicolas Derosier, La fuite du roi d’Angleterre [The Flight of the King of England], Complete, for Two Alto Recorders or Violins and Basso Continuo. Edited by David Lasocki. Basso Continuo Realization by Bernard Gordillo. Published 2023.
King James II of Great Britain, a Roman Catholic, fled England for France in 1688. The British Parliament held him to have abdicated, and he was replaced by the Protestant Stadhouder of the Dutch Republic, who reigned in Britain as King William III along with his wife Mary II (one of James’s daughters). James battled William’s forces in Ireland, but eventually lost at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690. At least the early parts of these fateful events were depicted in music by Nicolas Derosier (ca. 1643–ca. 1703), a French Roman Catholic musician, teacher, and composer living in Amsterdam. Presumably he was more sympathetic to James than the Dutch burghers of time would have been but he hoped that this topical theme would attract their interest. We hope that it will also attract yours. La fuite was first edited by Thurston Dart in 1959, but in truncated form: only the first eight of the fourteen short movements. Our edition is complete. Enjoy this charming program music in the French style.
