This movement comes from the last organ book of Michel Corrette who lived through three French monarchs: Louis, XIV, Louis XV and Louis XVI. This book which was published in 1787 is the last book of organ music published before the French Revolution. Its title is curious: Livre d’orgue dans un genre nouveau – Organ book in a new style. Corrette was seemingly reinventing the organ in that he was presenting novel works, most notably the Offertoires with thunder. Moreover, he was experiment with different sorts of registration eg. The Clairon with the foundation stops, just to name one.
As was the custom of the day, the liturgy was accompanied with relatively brief exchanges from the organ which alternated with the chanting of the religious community whether they be monks or nuns. The French saw the organ as a voice in its own right.
The key of B flat is unusual as it departed from the standard eight church tones, the first four largely minor and the second four major. The Grand Jeu was a composition for the loudest or literally ‘big stops’: the trompettes, clairon, cornets, cromorne, prestants and the pedal bombarde. The term fugue might appear a little misleading here in that it does not resemble anything of the genre as practised in the German school. The French fugue was simply a recurring theme without development.
