Les folies d’Espagne (Lully)

“La Folía” (Spanish) or “Follies” (English) is one of the most popular themes and chord progressions of the Baroque era. Although it is not known exactly who invented the original chord progression, scholars indicate that Jean-Baptiste Lully was one of the first composers to write down this musical material in 1672 in his piece “Folies d’Espagne”, along with the French composer André Danican Philidor, the elder. Hundreds of composers used this chord progression, i-V-i-VII-III-VII-i-V, thereafter. In the Baroque era composers such as Corelli, Scarlatti, Vivaldi, Haendel and Bach made their own compositions based on the Follies. In the present version, I transferred the Baroque model to the harmonic language of modal jazz.