L'Allure D'un Jardin: A Song History

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“L’Allure D’un Jardin” is one of twelve pieces in Ellen Pratt’s Ensemble Arrangements For The Mountain Dulcimer, Volume 7, the seventh book in her series of ensemble arrangements for dulcimer groups.[1] The listing gives it five parts: four for dulcimers in DAD tuning, one of them playable on standard or bass dulcimer and another a chord backup, plus a baritone part in ADA.[1] According to the listing, the book draws on traditional and classical material and also includes some originals, yet it does not identify this piece’s composer or say which of those categories it belongs to.[1] Pratt has been composing for the dulcimer since about 2004, and her ensemble writing and arranging grew out of her membership in a dulcimer orchestra in northeastern Connecticut.[2]

Etching of a large formal garden with patterned flower beds, a palace and crowds of strollers

Jacques Callot, Le Parterre de Nancy ou Jardin de Nancy, etching, 1625. A palace garden at Nancy, shown for the title; it has no connection to the piece.

The title is French: allure can mean speed or pace, the way a person carries themselves, or the general appearance of a thing, and jardin means garden, so the phrase reads roughly as “the look of a garden.”[3][4] The sources consulted here do not say what, if anything, the title refers to.[1][2]

Our book that contains the song "L'Allure D'un Jardin"

Sources

  1. Ellen Pratt: "Ensemble Arrangements For The Mountain Dulcimer, Volume 7".
  2. DulcimerDownloads: "Ellen Pratt".
  3. Cambridge Dictionary: "allure" (French-English).
  4. Cambridge Dictionary: "jardin" (French-English).
  5. Image: Jacques Callot, Le Parterre de Nancy ou Jardin de Nancy, etching, 1625. The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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