Dedicated to “my niece Antoinette Chaminade”.

Pastorale enfantine appeared in as a piano four hands piece in Félix Le Couppey’s Recueil des Enfants 20 Morceaux très faciles a deux, a trois et a quartre mains, a pedagogical anthology in 1885 (Hamelle). Later this piece appeared as solo piano and piano four hands in the 1899 edition of Félix Le Couppey’s Recueil des Enfants 24 Petits Morceaux très faciles et progressifs à 2, 3, et 4 mains. (The publication history in Le Recueil des enfants suggests the 4-hand version predates the solo version, and also in Enoch catalog in 1913 list the piano solo version as a transcription). In the late 1890s, solo piano (E 3 H, E. & C. 5006) and four hands (E. & C. 1912) editions were issued independently

The piece evokes rustic freshness through lilting rhythms, gentle melodies, and a warm harmonic palette.

Transcriptions
Piano: by Chaminade
Violin (or flute) and piano: by Ernest Alder in 1898 (E. & C. 3600)
Cello and piano: by B. Albert in 1897 (E. & C. 3457)