Albert Fuller, 81, champion of early music
NEW YORK - Albert Fuller - an influential harpsichordist, conductor, teacher, and author and the founder of two important early music organizations, the Aston Magna Foundation for Music and the Humanities and the Helicon Foundation - died Saturday of congestive heart failure at his home in Manhattan. He was 81.
In the 1960s and 1970s, when the period-instrument revival was gathering force, Mr. Fuller was one of several early music specialists who helped build an audience for Baroque music, training generations of performers in early music technique and interpretation.
French music, which he studied in Paris, was one of his specialties, and his recordings of music by Rameau are particularly well regarded. And his 1977 recording of Bach's Brandenburg Concertos, with his Aston Magna ensemble, was a high-water mark of early-music discography.
In the 1980s, Mr. Fuller became interested in performances of 19th-century repertory using original instruments - forte pianos, as well as violins, violas, and cellos using gut strings - and he coached younger players in the art of historical performance.
Like many early-music specialists, he devoted himself to producing authoritative editions of 17th-century works and to keeping track of musicological discoveries and developments. But Mr. Fuller insisted that the performances reflect something of a modern musician's inner life.
"The authenticity I'm interested in," he told The 
