Music at Paxton: John Butt

Paxton House, 19/07/2026

John Butt (Harpsichord)

My second report from Music at Paxton takes us to the magnificent Ballroom in Paxton House, recently restored from its function primarily as a picture gallery, with an abundance of excellent but rather dark paintings, into a much airier room, with fewer paintings, and a much lighter touch. It’s a splendid room for music making, with good sight lines and a mellow acoustic, and today it was the venue for a sort of lecture recital by Professor John Butt, taking us on a tour of solo harpsichord music from Couperin to J S Bach. I have known and performed with Professor Butt for over 20 years, singing Handel and Mozart with him. Highlights were Handel’s Messiah with the Dunedin Consort in the Queen’s Hall, Handel’s Saul at Glasgow University and the Dunedin recording of Bach’s St Matthew Passion on Linn Records.

It was therefore a treat to listen to him perform this delightful recital at Paxton. Using the Dunedin Consort’s harpsichord, a modern copy of an early 18th century Berlin instrument, which has exactly the right quality of sound for the Ballroom at Paxton, Professor Butt demonstrated both the development of harpsichord music across borders but also the way solo keyboard music evolved over the period from the mid-17th century to the mid-18th century. His lecture style is a delightful mixture of erudition, artistry and humour, and the very reasonably sized audience, for a Sunday morning, was kept informed and amused for about an hour and a half. His lectures at Glasgow University must be fun!

I have been very lucky over my long career as a singer to work very closely with three of the finest harpsichord players in the UK over the last 50 years, Trevor Pinnock, John Kitchen and John Butt, and it has always fascinated me how these very different musicians tackle the same repertoire. Trevor is a constantly moving figure, almost bouncing at the keyboard, Dr Kitchen is also fairly animated in performance, but John Butt is a model of stillness over the keys. His wrists and fingers move lightning fast, but he himself remains quite serene, as if studying the pieces for the first time. Each one of these players is astonishing in their technique and bravura, but also in the intensity of their performances.

Professor Butt started with a series of pieces by Louis Couperin (c1626-1661), which brought out all the varieties of repertoire current at the time. I especially enjoyed Couperin’s Passacaille in C, an endlessly repeating bass motive around which wondrous silky melodies and variations are woven. He explained that Couperin had invented the unmeasured prelude, in which all the notes in the piece were written as the same length, in semi breves, and it was up to the performer to decide which metre and rhythm to use. It was a little like Eric Morecambe’s joke about playing all the right notes but not necessarily in the right order! Louis Couperin was another of those early composers who died tragically young, at 35.

Next we heard a Bergomasca by Frescobaldi, an older Italian master who was also influential in the evolution of harpsichord music, and then a Toccata by Johann Jacob Froberger, a German who knew Couperin and was influential in his development. Professor Butt’s playing continued to astound and please in equal measure.

Three pieces from Henry Purcell’s Suite 6 in D showed us how the continental influence affected England’s great master composer of the late 17th century, but also showed how he adapted that influence by composing a very English hornpipe. I sang in and recorded Purcell’s ‘King Arthur’ with Trevor Pinnock, which featured many a hornpipe, and I can still visualise Trevor bouncing up and down at his harpsichord, almost dancing to Purcell’s catchy music.

We crossed the Channel again to hear music by another Couperin, this time François, nephew of Louis, who became the most famous of the Couperin dynasty of composers, and who published both his own harpsichord works and also a teaching manual for up and coming players, ‘L’Art de toucher le Clavecin’. We heard two pieces, the second of which, ‘Les Barricades Mystérieuses’ was a lolloping, rocking piece which went down a treat in the room. No one seems to know why this piece was so named, but its four parts sounded almost modern in their interweaving.

John Butt ended his recital with six preludes and fugues from J S Bach’s ‘ Well-Tempered Clavier’, and what an excursion through genius it turned out to be. Each piece had its own nature, and style, and once again, Professor Butt was a fascinating source of information and entertainment, explaining the ins and outs of each piece.

A warm ovation greeted him at the end, and we wandered out into the July sunshine of the beautiful parkland around Paxton House, feeling that all was well with the world.

I’ll be back at Paxton next weekend for the end of the festival, but I would encourage any of our readers living in the Borders to check out the many interesting performances scheduled for next week. Music at Paxton deserves to be supported.