 La vie d’Antoine Loyer est à elle seule un roman dont l’intrigue se joue entre le 18e et le 19e siècle. Né à Clermont-Ferrand, il étudie la guitare avec Vidal qui le présente comme un des meilleurs guitaristes de sa génération. Il s’engage ensuite comme militaire dans la garde royale et ce très peu de temps avant la révolution française, ce qui va évidemment le forcer à quitter la France. Il trouve refuge à Hambourg et commence à publier ses œuvres, puis c’est à Saint-Pétersbourg qu’il trouvera finalement une place sereine pour enseigner son art et composer. Il continuera les voyages en Europe comme concertiste et retrouva enfin Paris où il mourra à 84 ans en 1852. Son œuvre est toute aussi passionnante, en témoigne ce recueil fleuve de… 5 disques ! Il compile les duos, forme résolument importante dans la littérature guitaristique du 19è siècle. Interprétés ici par Antonio Rugolo, guitariste remarquable qui avait consacré un disque à la redécouverte des originaux de la suite populaire brésilienne de Villa-Lobos, et Angelo Gillo, cette musique pleine de surprises, d’élégance et exploratrice de beaucoup de modes de jeu et sonorités spécifiques de la guitare continue de défricher ce répertoire encore trop confidentiel. (Jérôme Leclair) A notable first on record, and another valuable addition to the unrivalled library of guitar music across the ages from Brilliant Classics. Among the most significant composers of guitar duos in the early 19th century, Antoine De Lhoyer was born in September 1768 in Clermont-Ferrand. His musical talents manifested themselves from early on, and he trained in Paris. His teacher Vidal paid tribute to him as ‘the finest guitarist in Europe’. However, at the age of 20, de Lhoyer embarked on a military career as a member of the King’s Guards, shortly before the French Revolution. Life in France rapidly becoming uncongenial for someone with his loyalties, he left France in a hurry and eventually settled in Hamburg, where his compositions were first published at the turn of the 19th century. De Lhoyer’s travels were by no means over, and over the following decades he took up posts as a professional music teacher and performer in St Petersburg, Paris, Corsica, Aix-en-Provence and Alger, the new capital of the French colony in north Africa. Eventually returning to the French capital, he died there in 1852, at the age of 84. The extant duos on this album were composed between 1814 and 1826, and they comprise a substantial proportion of his total output. One would expect the style of his music to reflect the lively, cosmopolitan nature of his career, and so they do, often cast in three- and four-movement sonata forms with picturesque interpolations such as the ‘hunt’ movement of Op.35 No.2 and the graceful Sicilienne of Op.35 No.5. The eight-movement Fantasie Concertante Op.33 is like a Mozartian serenade, with a superbly flowing Andante con variazioni directly succeeded by a brief but tranquil Adagio. There are two sets of 12 Waltzes in a much lighter vein, like Schubert’s collections of dances, and a set of six two-movement and unfailingly elegant Serenades Op.36. Lhoyer had an extraordinary gift for cantabile melodies and his slow movements often resemble songs without words. Some of them, like the Adagios of Op.31 No.1 and Op.33, count among the most beautiful and radiant music written for the guitar in the 19th century.
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