In 1682, Versailles became the main residence of Louis XIV and it needed new assistant chapel masters; in the end, the King imposed his choice, and that was Lalande, the King's favourite, a young man of 26 who would become Versailles's great composer of religious music. Bringing a new vision of the orchestra after the inflexible Lully, he dared to create completely new musical architectures, with new orchestral combinations that his predecessors never attempted, foregrounding some rarer solo instruments. In this sense, he represents the missing link between Lully and Rameau, the last scion of the French baroque orchestral tradition. For this record, a little stone in the monument to Lalande's 77 great motets, Vincent Dumestre and his Poème harmonique have chosen to showcase his first sallies in writing for the Chapelle Royale with Ecce nunc from 1683 and above all the grandiose Deitatis majestatem from 1681, and the record runs up to the final corrections – Lalande incessantly edited his work – of the Te Deum. This work provides the most striking sonic image of majesty: the Te Deum, composed in 1684, was re-written many times up until the 1720s, the date of the final signed edition. This version, which shows the later development of Lalande's writing, is also made remarkable because in it the composer has noted the precise duration of each verse! This gives us a precise idea of the metronomical tempos that he used – and what a precious tool for today's musicians. This album, recorded in public at the Chapelle Royale in Versailles, follows this demanding and unflagging rhythm to within a few dozen seconds. © SM/Qobuz