L'Art du Violon, ou Division des Écoles choisies dans les Sonates Itallienne, Françoise et Allemande, Précédée d'un abrégé de principes pour cet Instrument... la Musique, Gravée par Mlle. Potel Fme. Calodeaux... Seconde Edition Revue et Corigée.

Paris: Decombe. 1801. Second edition. Folio. 3ff. (preliminary title, illustrated title, publication announcement), iv, 287 pp, [i] (blank) + 4 large folding plates of music. Title signed by the publisher, also correcting the printed address. Engraved. Contemporary marbled paper over half vellum, stamped at spine. An exceptional copy, with scattered light foxing, generally clean and fine throughout, wide-margined and untrimmed, including the often-damaged (here excellent) 4 large foldout plates of music, each 46 x 34 cm (here well collated into 2). (Tartini's "L'arte del Arco").

The rare second edition (expanded from the first of 1798) of this very important treatise on playing the violin, Cartier's major work. RISM BVI p. 209; Hirsch I, 103. It includes the remarkable illustrated title, designed and engraved by F. Debret, with text by Lefrançois. The finely engraved text appears within a wide architectural border decorated with portrait medallions of the famous violinist-composers Corelli, Tartini, Mozart, Stamitz, Gavines and Le Clair.



"From 1791 to 1821 [Cartier] was assistant leader of the Paris Opéra orchestra. In addition, he was a member of the court orchestra from 1804 to 1830, serving under both Napoleon and the Bourbon regime... This imposing volume ["L'art du violon"] contained a comprehensive selection of sonatas and single movements composed by Italian, French and German masters of the 17th and 18th centuries. Cartier included both manuscripts and early editions, and he salvaged a number of masterpieces from oblivion. For example, the volume contained the first publication of Tartini's Devil's Trill Sonata (after a manuscript copy owned by Baillot) and of Bach's Fugue in C major for violin solo (after a copy owned by Gaviniès). Equally important was a reprint of seven sonatas by Nardini, after an edition of 1760 (now lost), and the first complete republication of Tartini's L'arte del arco, consisting of 50 variations on a gavotte by Corelli. In collecting and publishing all this material, Cartier secured for himself an important place in the history of the violin.” (Boris Schwarz, Grove Online) (6261)

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Printed Music

Classical Music

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