Who wrote music for the harpsichord?

Answer 1

The harpsichord was the central keyboard instrument for secular settings from 1400 to 1780, and all composers who were born and lived during that period would have written their keyboard music for the harpsichord. The last major composers who wrote music for the harpsichord were Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven. Beethoven's Pathetique Sonata was written for both harpsichord and fortepiano.

The most important composers for the harpsichord were: the English Virginal Composers such as Byrd, Bull, Gibbons, Farnaby, etc.; Frescobaldi, Froberger, Sweelinck, Chambonieres, L. Couperin, D'Anglebert; and of course the greatest being Bach, Handel, Scarlatti, F. Couperin, and Rameau.

Most of the music written for the harpsichord since the 18th century is neither as charming, profound, sensible, or fitting to the characteristics of the harpsichord's special qualities. Rather it is merely the overlay of the modern style of music (being Atonal in nature) superimposed on that timbre, which is one reason why most music written in our time for this particular instrument finds so few enthusiasts.

By contrast, the earlier styles of music grew out of an understanding of the nature and advantages of the sound of the harpsichords of those times and as such were constructed around the sound peculiar to the harpsichord.