Manuscript document on vellum. Signed by the composer

Addressed to Lully as "Compositeur de la Musique de la Chambre du Roi." Large oblong octavo (179 x 240 mm.).

Lully acknowledges receipt of wages in cash the amount of one and fifty livres, his salary for the preceding quarter (July-September) of the current year. Dated 17 October 1676 at conclusion and signed in full, "Jean Baptiste Lully."

With small oval duty handstamp to head of royal device surrounded by the words "Generalité de Paris," with "Quittance" to left of device, "Cinq Sols" to right. Vellum very slightly browned; some creasing; two small holes, just touching the word "cent" and the descender on the "p" of Lully's signature. "Lully, regarded throughout Enlightenment Europe as the leading figure in French music, created a style which was truly his own, drawing on many sources which he was probably better able to assimilate than anyone else in his time. The language he forged, and to which he sometimes brought exceptional breadth, could leave no one indifferent, and it still attracts audiences today with its power, clarity, equilibrium, coherence, poetry and exquisite sensitivity." Jérôme de la Gorce in Grove Music Online

As none of Lully's musical autograph manuscripts have survived, documents such as this, dating from his important ballets de cour period, are among the only examples of his hand extant.

A fine example from a leading 17th century composer, regarded as the creator of the French Baroque tradition in opera and ballet.