Music in the 14th Century rl Chapter Outline Until the middle or end of the 13th century, the prevailing musical style of : western Europe was essentially international. No distinctively regional styles France:The Ars nova | | _ of composition existed. Indeed, the organa, motets, and conduetus emanating _-_‘The Roman de Fauvel ao | __ from Paris, as we have seen, were copied and distributed throughout the conti- Po ae cri FE nent and even across the English Channel, lass Ordinary: Secular Song ‘The Ars subtifior at the End of the 14th Century : Tn the 14th century, by contrast, important regional differences began to | emerge. Vernacular poetry—that is, poetry written in the native language of | the poet, be it English, French, Spanish, or Italian—replaced Latin poetry in importance, and composers responded to this development by setting to music __taly:TheTrecento an increasing number of texts written in their own tongue. Composers them- England selves became more prominent and less anonymous, actively connecting their names with theit works with far greater frequency than in previous centuries | Gee Focus: The Rise of the Composer). Instrumental Music FRANCE: THE ARS NOVA In France, there was a growing sense that music had entered a new era in the | carly decades of the 14th century. Composers self-consciously called what they were doing the ars nova, or “new art” This term, which has become a label for much of 14th-century French music in general, is the title of a treatise written around 1320 and attributed to the theorist-composer Philippe de Vitry (1291-1361). At about the same time, Johannes de Muris (ca.1300-1350) wrote his Ars novae musicae (“The New Art of Music”). In 1324-1325, Pope John ‘XXII acknowledged the influence of the ars nccw and condemned it as decadent and dangerous in a papal bull (see Primary Evidence:’The Pope Condemns the rs nova). The theorist Jacques de Liége (ca. 1260-after 1330), in his Speculum ‘musicae (“The Mirror of Music,” 1330), also criticized the new practices. | ‘What was this new art? Its chief characteristic was enhanced rhythmic flex- } | ibility. Much of Philippe de Vitry’s treatise drs noua isin fact devoted to issues p | of rhythmic notation, including the following: © The increased use of the minim and semiminim, # The legitimization of duple meter as fully equal to triple. Prior to the 13h century, duple meter was used to a far more limited extent. «Imperfection by notes of more remote values instead of by notes of the next shorter value. fg «© The use of red ink (“coloration”) to make otherwise perfect rhythmic values j imperfect. A breve written in red ink, for example, was understood as having a ‘two-thirds the duration of a breve in the same context written in black ink. _Medieval art in al its forms—painting, sculpture, archi- tecture, musio—has for the most part been transmitted anonymously. Medieval artists, asa rule, sublimated their own fame to what they often referred to as “the greater glory of God.” “Toward the end of the medieval era, attitudes ‘began gradually to change. We can connect the names of Léonin and Pérotin with the Magnus liber organi of the 13th century through only a single surviving account. But beginning in the 13th century, the master builders responsible for the great Gothic cathedrals began to be buried in the structures, their names inscribed on the floor. By the early 14th century, more and more art ists were associating their names with their creations. Painters—at least some of them—began to sign their ‘works, and composers followed suit. Although plenty of musical works continued to be transmitted anonymously for many subsequent centuries, the surviving sources from the 14th century onward preserve a far greater number of composers’ names than ever before. Some composers even went out of their way to assemble col- lections of their work. The French poet and compos- ex Guillaume de Machaut (ca. 1300-1377) compiled ‘what amounts to a complete edition of his poetry and music. The Squarcialupi Codex, a sumptuous musical manuscript copied in Ttaly during the first half of the 15th century, provides not only the names but even por- traits of several of the 14th-century composers whose works it includes. (One of them is Francesco Landini, ca 1325-1397, whose portrait appears on page 86.) Com- posers were beginning to be acknowledged as artists rather than as artisans, as creators rather than craftsmen. Vitey also played an important role in codifying the use of mensuration signs. “These signs indicated whether the subdivision of breves and semibreves should be “understood as perfect ot imperfect. Tivo temporal relationships are relevant here: the tempus and the prolatio. ‘© The tempus is the relationship of the breve to the semibreve. When perfect, there are tree semibreves to each breve; when imperfect there are two. «© The proltio is the relationship of the semibreve to the minim. When perfect major”), there are three minims to each semibreve; when imperfect (“minor”) there are two. ‘There are thus four possible combinations of perfect and imperfect zempus and prolati, Each ofthe four basic mensuration signs indicates one of these four combina~ tions, as Example 3-1 summarizes. The system codified by Philippe de Viuy increased the clarity and flexibility of mensural notation. With only minor modifications, this system would stay in effect throughout the Renaissance and gradually develop into the modem system of notation in the 17th century."The modern-day time signature known as alle breve—a semicirele often corrupted into a stylized “C” with a line down the middle—is a vestige of early- 14th-century mensural notation; even though we no longer use breves, we understand the sign to mean a beat of two half notes in each measure, the half note being the descendant of the medieval breve. The Roman de Fauvel The ars nwa style is amply evident in a number of works composed in or around 1316 for the satirical allegory Le Roman de Fauvel (“The Story of Fauvel”). The author of this allegory, Gervais de Bus, was a clerk who worked at the French court from 1313The rhythmic flexibility ofthe Ars nova, according to Pope John XXII, promoted wantanness at the expense of devotion. The “notes of... small values,” he declared in the papel bull Docta sanctorum patrum of 1324-1325, were “csturbing” the Divine Office. The dacument gives eloquent witness tothe church's ongoing ambivalence about the role of music in worship. The pope acknowledges the need for polyphony, “particularly on feast days,” but argues that the original melodies ofthe plainchant are to be left intact and recognizable as such. The hockets to which the pope further objects —rapid-fire passages in which a melodic line bounces back and forth between different voices—had actually been inuse long before the ars nova, see Certain disciples of the new school, much occupying themselves with the measured dividing of the tempore, display their prolation in notes that are new to us, prefer~ ting to devise new methods of their own rather than to continue singing in the old way. Therefore the music of the Divine Office is disturbed with notes of these small values, Moreover, they hinder the melody with hockets, they deprave them with descants, and sometimes they pad them out with upper parts made out of secular songs. The results that they often seem to be losing sight ofthe fun- damental sources of our melodies in the Antiphoner and Gradual, and forget what itis that they are burying under their superstructures. They may become entirely ignorant of the ecclesiastical modes, which they have already ceased to distinguish and the limits of which they abuse in the prolixity of their notes. The modest rise and temperate EXAMPLE 3-1 Mensuration signs MENSURATION TEMPUS FROLATION EXAMPLE sree Imperfect Minor ' Cone ee 6 I cued re ee QO Peas de ll cal mepefet Map meee eo Mh emelll Pevfect Major Oe goa oll descents of plainsong, by which the modes themselves are recognized, are entirely obscured. The voices move santly to and fro, intoxicating rather than soothing the ear, while the singers themselves try to convey the emotion of the music by their gestures. The consequence of all this is that devotion, the true aim of all worship, is neglected, and wantonness, which ought to be eschewed, increases. ‘This state of things, which has become the common ‘one, we and our brethren have come to regard as needing correction. Therefore we hasten to forbid these methods, or rather to drive them more effectively ont ofthe house of God than has been done in the past. For this reason, having taken counsel with our brethren, we strictly command that xo one shall henceforth consider himself at liberty to use these methods, or methods like them, in the singing of the canonical Office or in solemn celebrations of the Mass Nevertheless itisnotour wish to forbid the oceasional uuse—especially on feast days or in solemn celebration of the Mass and the Divine Offic—of some consonances, for example, the octave, the fifth, and the fourth, which heighten the beauty of the melody: Such intervals, there~ fore, may be sung above the ecclesiastical chant, but in such a way that the integrity of the chant remains intact and that nothing in the prescribed music be changed. Used thus, the consonanees would, more than any other music is able to do, both soothe the hearer and inspire his devotion without destroying religious feeling in the minds ofthe singers. Soute: Henry Raynor A Social History of Music from the Middle gas 10 Boathoven London: Barrie & Jenkins, 1972), pp. 46-32 MODERN mansaes until 1338. A commentary on the dangers of corrupt and incompetent government ministers, it tells the story of a donkey named Pauvel who, through the intercession of the goddess Fortuna, ascends to the throne of France. He marries Vainglory, and together they produce new Fauvels, bringing ruin to France and the world. The name Fanrvel derives from the first letter of the following vices: Flaterie Flattery Avarice Avarice, greed Uialanie Villainy (“U” and “V” were interchangeable at the time) Variété Inconstancy, fickleness Envie Envy Lacheté Cowardice Fawve, moreover, was the name of a color—a dark yellow—that was widely associated with evil, deceit, and vanity 2 Gear tafe fone (2 ast Are om ‘The Roman de Fauvel. In tho Vth-contury ‘oman de Fouvel, the donkey Fauvel{top) ‘marries Vainglory, and on their wedding night they are visited by noisy (and masked) music makers, as pert of the tradition of charivar, in which revelers strive to disrupt the newlyweds. The instruments (see Focus: Instruments of the Medieval Era) are mostly “high” (loud) ‘ones: bells, cymbals, and many varieties ‘of drums, along with alone viele Source: Me Fr 146 (34 Le Cherivar discordant Iusielans from the Story of Fauvel wten by erate du Boi (vellum) French Sdnoo, [th entry VUiblotheque National, Pari, Franca! Flmmarion/The Bridgeman At LibraryOne of the 12 surviving manuscripts of Le Roman de Fawel includes a number of interpolated musical compositions, ranging from short monophonic pieces 10 large-scale polyphonic motets. The motet Garvie gallus/In nova fert/Neuma may be by Philippe de Viery himself, who refers to it in his treatise Ary nove to illustrate certain features of the new art ‘The untested tenor of Garrit gallus/in nova fert/Neuma is freely composed and bears the simple indication Newma, a kind of generic designation for a melisma. The tenor is structured according to the principle of isorhythm, a term coined in the 20th century to describe a technique common to many motets and Mass move- ments written between roughly 1300 and 1450. An isorhythmic tenor is one based on a fixed rhythmic and melodic pattern that is repeated at least once (and usually more often) over the course of an entire work. Although the tenors of many clausulae of the 12th and 13th century festured repeating chythmic patterns, the isorhythmic units of the 14th century are far longer and not so closely tied to the basie units of the rhythmic modes. Isorhythm became the preferred structure of the motet in the 14th century: most ofthe 34 motets in the Roman de Fare! are isorhythmic, as are most of Guillaume dde Machaut's 23 motets. ‘The rhythmic pattern of an isorhythmic tenor is called its talea (meaning “eut- ting” or “segment”); the melodic pattern is called its color (a term borrowed from rhetoric and used to describe certain techniques of repetition). Although zalea and color are sometimes of the same length within a given tenor, more often they are not. ‘The talea of the tenor of Garrit gallus/In nava fert/Newma (Example 3-2) is stated six times in succession, beginning at measures 1, 26, 51, 76, 101, and 126. The color, in contrast is three times as long and stated in its entirety only twice, beginning at mes- sures 1 and 76. ‘The tenor of this motet also illustrates the legitimization of duple meter in the ary nova. The talea is rhythmically symmetrical, and its central notes (marked in Example 3-2 in small brackets) are written in red in the original manuscript, signifying. they are to be imperfected, that is lose one-third of their normal value. The resulting altemation between triple and duple meters is one of the rhythmic novelties that so agitated Pope John XXII, who condemned the mixture of perfect and imperfect men- surations (see Primary Evidence: The Pope Condemns the rs nav), Polyphonic Settings of the Mass Ordinary Composers of the 14th century devoted relatively little energy to polyphonic settings of the complete Mass Ordinary, limiting themselves largely to individual movements ‘pairs of movements (the Gloria and Credo, for example, or the Sanctus and Agnus Dei). The idea of composing a polyphonic setting ofthe entire Mass Ordinary would become important in the 15th century but remained largely unexplored in the 14th. ‘Three polyphonic cycles that have survived from the 14th century—known by the location of their various sources as the Mass of Tournai and the Mass of Barcelona— are almost certainly miscellanies gathered after the fact. These are not, in other words, musically integrated cycles of the Ordinary as a whole. EXAMPLE 3-2 The toler ofthe tenor in Garritgalla/In nova frt/Newma i roe ine (ve ffisten D1 Tack 22 ‘mysearchlab (th aling onion) PHILIPPE DE VITRY (7) Sarit Gabusn neva fetes Soot intology V18ea era Philippe de Vitry (1291-1361) laoiti Philippe de Vitry was a man of many talents: composer, music theorist, poet, counselor at the French court, and bishop. He was a friend of the great Ttalian poet Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch), who called him “the only true poet among the French.” Unlike Guillaume de Machaut, who carefully guarded and organized his musical works, Philippe de Vitry rarely associated his name with his music. The motet Garrit _gallus/In nova fert/Newma, for example (Snthology 1/16), is actributed to him because an example of it appears in PRINCIPAL WORKS Philippe de Vitry’s works are plagued by questions of authorship and attribution; he appears to have devoted himself primarily to the genre of the motet, of which he ‘composed perhaps as many as two dozen, (ioe via mesial a ola (axl eaasteyaN ie Born October 31 in Vitry (eastern France) another work attributed to him, the treatise Ars nova. Yet | ea. 1820 Begins 20 years of service to Louis de the evidence that he wrote the drs noua (and, by extension, | Bourbon, who later becomes the Duke of the motet) is quite thin, and some scholars have argued coun: that neither i his. Philippe de Vitry nevertheless enjoyed | 1327 Serves as Louis's representative to the great renown during his lifetime as both a composer and papal court in Avignon. iusic theorist. Which compositions and treatises were in | 4349 Holds a series of positions at the French fact hs isa question that scholars will continue to wrestle ioaicouneen i with for some time, seeking out further references to him 1351 Appointed Bishop of Meaux, in northern from other 14th-century documents and perhaps even foe new sources of I4th-century music not yet know. - (oefListen ‘One possible exception to this pattern is Guillaume de Machaut'’s Mese de Nostre Dame (Mass of Our Lady"). Composed sometime during the early 1360s, the work is the only 14th-century polyphonic setting of the complete Mass Ordinary known to have been written by a specific composer. Yet even here, the musical connections among the various movements are subtle and do not revolve around shared musical ‘material or a particular technique. The Gloria and Credo are clearly linked through extended passages that are closely similar, as are the Sanctus and Agnus Dei, but the brief melodic gestures that have been interpreted by some critics as a kind of ehread running through the entire eycle seem fairly inconsequential by comparison. ‘This lack of thematic unity, however, in no way detracts from the remarkable force of the music. Machaut differentiates between movements with large quantities of text and those with relatively litte text. The former are set in a predominantly syllabic, conductus-like fashion (note against note), whereas the latter are set in the style of an isorhythmic motet ‘Whatever their differences in style, all the movements are based on a plainchant version of the appropriate element of the Ordinary. Thus the tenor of the Kyrie derives from the plainchant Kyrie Cuncripotens Genitor Deus (see Example 1-6).’The taea of the tenor in the first Kyrie is extremely brief (only four measures in modern transcription), and the only rest comes at the very end, which helps articulate each successive return of the talea. The col adhering to the pitches of the chant exactly, is stated only once. Ina practice that became common around the middle of the 14th century, Machaut includes a voice known as the contratenor (meaning “against the tenor”) that occupies the same range as the tenor.’ The contratenor, like the tenor, ythmic, butts alea in the first Kyrie is longer. Its fully stated twice—in measures I-12 and 13-25—then GUILLAUME O& MACHAUT Messe de Noste Dame| | 7 In the tradition of the 12ch- century trouvéres, Guillaume de Machaut was a poet as well as a musician. His texts abound with puns, extended imagery, and pos- sibly encryptions. The formal structures can be com- plex at times, using chyme and meter in ways that are far from ordinary. His Liore du wir dit (‘Book of the True Poem”) is a sprawling, quasi-autobiographical collection of letters, lyrics, and song settings written, in praise of a young woman, Péronne d’Armentiéres, with whom Machaut was deeply infatuated late in his life. ‘Machaut’ accomplishments in the realm of music ate even more significant. He elevated the formes fives of| virelai, rondeau, and ballade to new heights and inspired subsequent generations of poets and composers to ve 30tThoughts), Plaisance (Pleasure), and 1nca (Hope) tothe elderly composer at wark in his study, “This image is from ane of the six "Machaut Manuscripts" con- taining the composer's musical and postic works and prepared directly under his supervision Sours: Bibliotheque Nationale de France Guillaume de Machaut (ea. 1300-1377) Maes ee cultivate these genres, He also wrote what is apparently. the first polyphonic setting of the Mass Ordinary as a coherent cycle. ‘Machaut always moved in elite circles, working at the courts of the Duke of Berry, the king of Navarre, and the king of Cyprus, as well as the French royal court. He kept tight control over the copying and distribution of his music: only 22 of his 143 musical works are pre- served in sources known to have originated outside his immediate circle, The 6 “Machant Manuscripts,” con- sisting of some 2,100 leaves, were prepared under his supervision and transmit almost all his music in mul- tiple copies, each with the inevitable variant versions associated with the process of copying by hand. The differences in the readings are sometimes slight, some- times not PRINCIPAL WORKS ‘The large majority of Machaut’s works are secular. He cultivated all the farmes fives of his day, and his output includes some 42 ballades, 22 rondeaux, and 33 virelais He also wrote 19 luis, lengthy monophonic works of 12 strophes but through-composed rather than strophic, reflecting the variety of different poetic forms from strophe to strophe. Almost all of Machaut’s 24 motets are isorhythmic; 19 of them are for 3 voices, the remain der for 4. eae vis biel aia ace ale MEU PisiVieah Che 63.1300 Born in northern France, possibly in Rheims, a. 1323 Becomes royal secretary to King John of Luxembourg, king of Bohemia; travels with him as far east as Russia before the king's death in 1346, | 1335 Appointed a canon of the cathedral at Rheims but travels widely over the next 40 years, serving » variety of rulers, 1377 __Dies at Rheims,0 # PART ONE restated partially in the last two measures. By virtue of its length and internal rests, i keeps the motion of the lower voices moving forward. The color of the contratenor, unrelated to any preexisting melody, is stated only once. The motetus (duplum) and triplum move freely in more rapid rhythms. In the Christe and the final Kyrie, the tae of the tenor and of the contratenor voices coincide. “The addition of the contratenor provided composers with a greatly expanded range of options for voice leading—that is, the manner in which two or more voiees move in relationship to one another. By the middle ofthe 14th century, only the third, fifth, sixth, and octave were considered acceptable intervals above the lowest sounding note. Given these restrictions, a fourth voice moving in the same range as the tenor—at times above it, at times below it—greatly increases the number of possible simultaneously sounding pitch combinations. Consider the opening of the Kyrie of Machaut’s Mass, for example. Without a contratenor, the A of the tenor could be harmonized in only one ofthe three basic ways shown in Example 3-3. Adding a contratenor a fifth or a major third below the tenor’ A, however, creates the four additional possibilities shown in Example 3-4, ‘more than doubling the number of potential sonorities from three to seven, “The melodic character of Machaut’ Kyrie is typical of mid-L4th-century polyph- ‘ony: somewhat angular, with large leaps (an upward seventh in the contratenor of Kyrie Tin measure 17, an upward major sixth in measures 21-22), hockets (from the Latin word for “*hiccough”) in measures 10 and 22, nd a good deal of syncopation throughout. ‘The principal cadences follow the standard formulas of the day, with the two seructural voives—the highest sounding voice and the tenor, which together provide the basic harmonic intervals—moving from a sixth to an octave (Example 3-5a) or froma third to a fifth (Example 3-Sb). Such cadences are found in Machaut’s Kyrie at measure 80 (sinth to an octave in the tenor and the triplum, the highest sounding voice at this point) and at measure 27 (third co fifth in the tenor and triplum), ‘Under certain circumstances, performers were expected to sharpen leading tones that were not notated as such (for a fuller discussion of this convention, part of what is nown as musica ficta, see Focus: Musica Ficta in Chapter 5).In the cadence at measure 27 of the Kyrie (and in Example 3-6), we can be certain that performers would have sharpened the G in the triplum that precedes the closing A. Otherwise they would be singing a tritone—a forbidden interval—against the Cf that Machaut explicitly speci- fied in the duplum. The combination of Gé and Ce here is part of a double leading- tone cadence, a favorite device of 14th-century composers in which a sharped seventh leads to the octave and a sharped fourth Ieads tothe fifth. (In modern transcriptions of music of this period, accidentals the performer would have applied are marked above the notes; accidentals indicated in the original source are notated beside the notes.) EXAMPLE 3-3 Possible sonorities with three voices.EXAMPLE 3-5 Cadential patterns in the Kyrie of Machaut’s uaa es EXAMPLE 3-6 Double leading-tone cadence at the end of Kyrie [in Machaut’s Messe de Nostre Dame. Messe de Nostre Dame. Double leading-tone cadences are also found at the end of the Kyrie If and IIL All of these cadences include parallel octaves and fifths. The theorist Johannes de Garlandia had recommended against the use of such parallel movement as early as 1300, but it would continue to be used well into the 15th century especially at cadences. Secular Song y the middle of the 14th century, three formes fixes—literally “fixed forms,” or struc tural patterns—had established themselves as the most important varieties of secular song in France: the ballade, virelai, and rondeau. These were at once both poetic and musical forms, each with its own characteristic pattern of rhyme and musical repeti- tion, with at least one line of refrain—that is, the same words sung to the same musicin every strophe (or verse). Musically, each of these forms consists of two parts, conven tionally labeled A and B. The first ending of a repeated part (A, B, or both) is known as, its ouvert open”), and the second ending as is clas (“close”). ‘The text of the ballade usually consists of three strophes of seven or eight lines, the last of which is a refrain. The rhyme pattern varies. That of Machaut’ Je puis trop bien ma dame comparer (“I May Well Compare My Lady") is ababcedD. (Lowercase letters indicate lines of text that are different in each strophe; upper- case letters indicate the refrain, which is identical throughout, both textually and musically.) Other typical rhyme patterns for the ballade include ababbebC, ababedE, and ababedeF. Musically the ballade falls into two distinct sections, the first of which is always repeated and the second of which is sometimes repeated. The music thus unfolds in the pattern AAB (like Machaut’s Je puis trop bien ma dame comparer; see the following table) or ABB. Ballades tend to be the most melismatic of all che formes fies used in I4th-century France, with a rhythmically active uppermost voice. Machaut’s Je puis trop is highly florid, yet the cadences are carefully aligned to the structure of the poetry. As in Machaut’s four-part setting of the Mass, the tenor and contratenor lines weave in and cout of one another. ‘The virelai follows the pattern AbbaA. The refrain, in other words, is sung at the beginning and end of each strophe. Virelais are typically set in a syllabic fashion, as in Machaut’ Douce dame jolie (“Sweet Pretty Lady”; see the following table). About aut 33 virelais have come down to us as monophonic works, although this does not preclude the possibility that other voices were added, either as accompaniment or in the form of improvised counterpoint. Virelus, like all songs of this period, could also be performed instrumentally, without any text at al. (oeffisten cor Tack 24 ‘mysearchlab [it szotngvasten) GUILLAUME DE MACHAUT Sour antoiogy (20 (Go iisten D1 Track 25 imysearchlab (vi soy tarlatin) GUILLAUME DE MACHAUT Douce dame Sear Antology((oListen The rondeau (plural, rondeaux) consists of eight lines of text set to music ct Tack 26 following the scheme ABaAabAB. Machaut’s rondeau Ma fin est mon commencement Beart nscotnazmit) (My Ena Ip My Beginning’) is apareulrly ingenious application ofthe form. The GILAOWEDEMAGIAT™” "cans (he highest oie) and the tenor—in a direct musical representation ofthe eres text are exact rerogrades of each other. In other words, the cant line, sung back- stand from end to beginning, exactly the sme as what the tenor sings forward from besinning to.endThe eontratenor ine, in carn, reverse self at midpoint: t moves forward from measure Ito the cadence at measure 20, then retraces its steps backward from measure 21 to the end. The idea that beginnings and endings are one and the same is deeply rooted in Christian theology, which connects death to physical and spiritual rebiec, ‘The Ars subtilior at the End of the 14th Century ‘The kind of ingenuity evident in Machaut’s Ma fi est mom commencement was part of a broader fascination with musical puzzles that occupied many composers in the last (quarter of the 14th centary, particularly in France. Much of this repertory has been called mannered or mannerist because itis self-conscious, complex, and sometimes GUILLAUME DE MACHAUT’S BALLADE JE PUIS TROP BIEN MA DAME COMPARER: THE RELATION OF TEXT AND MUSICAL STRUCTURE Scheme | Musical Structure Strophe 1 Je puis trop bien ma dame comparer | @ A first ending (ouvert) A fymage que fist Pymalion. b Dywoire fu, tant belle et sisans per | a A, second ending (ofos) Que plus ‘ama que Medea Jazon, | b Li folz ouais la prioit, © Mais 'ymage riens nelie respondolt. | ¢ 8 Einsi me fait celle quimon cuer font. | d (Qu’ades la pri et riens ne me respont. | 0 (refrain) GUILLAUME DE MACHAUT'S VIRELAl DOUCE DAME JOLIE: | priate wale) ola ae Weve UU | Musical Structure Rhyme Scheme A(refrain) A B, first ending (ouvert) 8, second ending (clos) > > a A Arefrain) A |downright obscure. But the term mannered has negative connotations that are unfair to this fascinating repertory, and most scholars working in this field today prefer the newly coined designation of ars subtilior (Latin for “the more subtle art") to acknowl- edge the central roles that subtlety, understatement, and misdirection play in this music. Composers writing in this style viewed music not only as an art of sound but also as an object of contemplation that could engage and challenge the intellect 2s well as the soul. The notational conventions that composers used to record this music present some formidable challenges. Among them are these: © Special note shapes that sometimes occur in only a single source, such as semi- breves with added swirls on their flags or semiminims with flags going both up and down from the same note head. * Special kinds of coloration used to indicate unusual varieties of syncopation, such as half-colored notes (half red, haf black) or hollow red notes, which indi- cate yet another kind of rhythmic change. ‘* Obscure verbal canons—rules—given as clues to guide the realization of a puzzling passage, although the rules themselves turn out to be part of the puzzle. ‘© Notational inconsistencies, with the meaning of certain note values, for exam- ple, changing within the course of a single work. Deciphering these works is an often delightful intellectual challenge, rather like doing an extremely difficult crossword puzzle. The manuscript originals can also be quite visually arresting, Jacob de Senleches’s virelai La harpe de melodie (“The Harp of Melody”) is notated on staff lines embedded in the frame of a harp; Baude Cordier’ Belle bonne, sage (*Beautifal, Good, Wise”), love song, is notated in the shape of a styl- ized heart. In this same tradition, Cordier’ rondeau Tou par compar (“In a Circle T Am Composed”) is notated in a circle see illustration). The two upper voices constitute a canon, in which one voice follows the other in striccimitation. The notational difficul- ties of these works, however, should not obscure their emotional intensity Cordier, like many composers of the ars subtilior, worked for a time at the papal court in Avignon, in southern France, at the time of the Great Schism. ‘This was the period from [378 to 1417 when rival popes claimed power over the church, one in Rome, the other in Avignon. (There was even a third pope for a brief time in Pisa.) AS if to legitimize itself and increase its prestige, the court at Avignon spared no expense to attract the best available talent in many fields. The Italian poet Petrarch worked there for a time, as did a number of gifted (if now slightly obscure) composers such as Cordier, Jacob de Senleches, Anthonello de Caserta, a certain Grimace, and one ‘Trebor (*Robert” spelled backward). The composer known only as Solage appears to have been one of these figures in and around Avignon. His polyphonic virelai Joeux de cuer (“Hearts Joy") exemplifies the sophisticated part-writing found in the ars subtilior chanson repertory of the late 14eh century. In the work's sole source, the Chantilly Codex, only the cantus voice is texted, It is certainly the most melodic of the four parts and the one with the widest range, spanning the interval of an eleventh at one point in a relatively short time (0m. 5-10), but the other voices weave themselves around it and around each other in an astonishingly intricate manner so that in the end each voice seems to carry equal ‘weight, even as each goes its own way with its own distinctive melodic ideas. Mga (oo Listen coz Tock? smysearchlab (vit sain arltion) SOLAGE ose84 ® PART ONE Baude Cordier, Tout par compas. In the Chantilly Codex, Baude Cordier’s rondeau Tour par compas aoeumes the visual form ofits text ("Ina Circle ‘Am Composed”). The visual pun goes even further: compas also means the drafting instrumont of the Compass, which is cleary the tool used to prepare the staves of this manuscript. The single line that ‘generates the two canonic upper voices Is notated Inthe outer circle; the tenor partis notated on the inner circle, The texts ofthe additional strophes are ‘written in the circles at the four corners. ‘Sure: hs 554/104 0.12, Tout par comps suy com poste iluminated composition by Brude Corda, rom collection of Medioval bollods, ott, and songs nk ‘on valu), Franes Scho), (15th enturyiMusee Conse, Chant, rence! Gieudon/The Bridgeman Ae Libary The early 15th century in France witnessed a turn away from the rhythmie com- plexities of the ars subtiior and toward a more straightforward style. This shift is gener- ally associated with the beginning of the Renaissance era in music. ITALY: THE TRECENTO Many of the developments in French music during the 14th century have their coun terparts in Italian musie—so many, in fact, that some scholars speak of an Traian ‘ars nova. The more common designation for Italian music of this period, however, is trecento. (The term means, literally, the 1300s, or the [4th century. Quattrocento is similarly used to designate Italian music ofthe 15th century.) “The principal secular vocal genres of the trecento are the ballata, the caccia, and the madrigal. As with the formes fixes in France, each of these had its own particular textual and musical characteristics ‘Phe ballata (plural, ballate) is formally similar to the French virelai of the same period (not, as we might expect, to the ballade). ‘The poetic form of the ballata is ‘AbbaA, with a refrain framing the internal lines of each strophe. Most ballate have three strophes, but some have only one; most are polyphonic (usually for two or three ((rflisten voices), but a few monophonic ones exist as well (eb2 Tack Francesco Landini’ Eola primavera (*Behold, Spring”), for two voices, exempli Imysearchla ui eseatoseie g.. eh halla genre, It features smooth melodic lines that project the text sylabcaly nol primovere Not all ballate are quite this syllabic, however. The openings of the first and second Score antlogy 24 section of the music are said to “thyme,” in that they share certain features of rhythmae ee and melody, as do the corresponding cadential measures of the two sections. This kind of musical rhyme can be found in many ballate. ‘The L4th-cencury Taian madrigal began as a literary form that by the 1340s had crystallized into a series of two or three strophes, each consisting of three lines, with a two-line ritornello at the very end. Musical settings of this poetry clearly reflect its textual structure. The ritornello is almost invariably set in a contrasting meter, as in Jacopo da Bologna’s Non al suo amante (“Never to Her Lover”). Composers of madri- gals often set the end (and sometimes the beginning) of individual lines to elaborate melismas, Almost all the trecento madrigal repertory is for two voices, with the upper voice the more florid of the two. Although the tenor is often texted, it lends itself equally well to instrumental performance. By the end of the 14th century, the madrigal was in decline. The new vocal genre of the same name that arose in the 1520s (see Chapter 6) had no direct connection ((oTisten co2 Tack smysearchlab (ih scl tari {ACOPO DA BOLOGNA ‘Non si suoamante Seon Anthology 125 ‘The caccia (plural, cacce) takes its name from the same root word as the (be{Listen English word “chase.” Caccia texts often deal, aptly, with hunting, although they ¢d2_Tack can also depict such lively scenes as fires, treet vendors’ cries, and the bustle of the Mysearchla nit ar tas marketplace, The music, usually for three voices, features two canonic upper parts _OREMZODAFIREN and an independent tenor. Many (but not all) cacce conclude with a ritornello that ony i28 can be monophonic, polyphonic, or canonic. Although written monophonically, the ritornello in Lorenzo da Firenze's A poste messe (“In Their Positions") can also be realized canonically Johannes Ciconia (ca, 1370-1412) is the leading composer of early-1Sth-century (ve‘Listen Italy. His Doctorum principem/Melodia suevisima/Vir mits is an example of anew kind b2 Tack ‘of work, the civic motet, written in praise of a particular person or place—in this case myBearchlab ising vetn Francesco Zabarella,an important authority on canon law from Padua in northern COMA Iealy and Ciconia’ protector and patron. The calor of the isorhythmic tenor is stated Suaneemmavr maa three times, each time in a different mensuration; thus, although the pitches of the tenor line repeat, the rhythmic pattern changes with each statement. The optional contratenor is constructed in the same way. The voice leading—with many hockets, a relatively free treatment of dissonance (especially in the contratenoz), and cadential parallel fifths: is typical ofthe late 14th and early 15th centuries, °$CO LANDINI (ca, 1325-1397), blinded by - LORENZO DA FIRENZE (. 1372 or 1373) was active smallpox asa child, served as organist at various churches in his native Florence. Flis works feature prominently in the Squarcialupi Codex, where he is portrayed with a por- tative organ on his knee. The bulk of his surviving music consists of 140 ballate, of which about two-thirds are for 2 voices, the remainder for 3. He also wrote 9 madrigals, 1 eaccia, and 1 virelai JACOPO DA BOLOGNA (flourished 1340-1360) wrote mostly madrigals, 25 of them for 2 voices, 7 for 3 voices. He was active at the courts of Milan and Verona and wrote a treatise on mensuration, but litle else is, known about him, at the church of San Lorenzo in Florence, where he may have studied with Landini. His surviving works include 7 monophonic ballate, 10 madrigals, a 3-voice caccia (Anthology), and 2 Mass movements. JOHANNES CICONIA (ca. 1370-1412) was born in Lidge (now in Belgium) but spent most of his career in Italy, frst in Rome, then at the Visconti coure in Milan and Pavia, and finally in the northern city of Padua. We possess more (and more varied) music by him than by any other composer active around 1400. These include motets, Mass movements, and songs with both French (irelais) and Ttalian texts (ballate and madeigals)aes FroncescoLaaiatis shown hr laying ‘pore organ. His fintthandisanthe keyboar, ie is lethand operates the bllons behind he insane tat ores ar through he pies. ‘vari th facta! gold Beaten exams tn — dort manusoriot ‘heinstmens shown this page include a, vil ie 2 pkey recorders, Shows, and at car yor onthe ponte oan, A CLOSER LOOK THE SQUARCIALUPI CODEX, assembled in Florence was an organist and composer in Florence. This enormous ca, 1410-1415, isthe single most important surviving collection comprises more than 350 works, including bal- ‘Source of trecento music. The menuseripttakes its name _late, cacce, and madrigals by Landini, Jacopo da Bologna, from a later owner, Antonio Squarcialupi (1416-1480), who and others. Composers works are grouped topthrin the Squall Cdox lof Lani’ 146 composions open togetnrin a cominsos sequence, asc the 23by Jacopo ds Balog, ad so on. ach Composers orton fhe menuserit oreo includes porta ad is name vis thobogaring of Landinte mame, nth ontinos ante nee page of te manuscript. The tach ihe complerf fe menusenpthas ani th atoroip of aech work eects the grow tng evareness ofthe root composer as an incu as: The parchment ives sre amore cata ‘han paper but also formar expensive to progace, A piece ot parchment 'smade framte prepared skin oa sheep or goat it ‘spot sutace tor The sting tate ofterente 7 ration of tho Mocieval rao eventvly ‘pre way around the File of he 12h cen tury tow notton ‘Source: TophamThe Imege Works.fa aa ee ENGLAND ; A small but impressive repertory of English song survives from the 13th and 14th | centuries. These works are roughly contemporary with the great English poct Geoflrey Chaucer (1342-1400), whose Canterbury Tales are full of musical imagery nant “in number”—that is, on the basis of their numerical ratios—“the voices of men” Syn tumor in with theie “subtlety” could use thirds to create a“smooth mixture and full consonance.” Score Antotoay 8 “The oldest known canon in Western music, a setting of the poem Sumer is icumen in (Summer has Come In"), testifies to this English predilection for thirds. Believed to have been written around 1250, it consists of arota—or round for two notated voices | and references to music making. | Stylistically, English composers and theorists were more inclined to use the inter- (ve isten i val of a third in practice than composers on the continent. As the early-I4th-century 62_Tack j commentator Walter Odington noted, although thirds could not be considered conso- _-mysearehlabs it cig west i ANONYRAOUS i that unfolds over a two-part rondellus, in which the two voices exchange phrases (A and B) continuously, following this scheme: | A B A B B A B A ‘The work is preserved in a manuscript that includes both Latin and English texts; which is the older version of the text is debatable, but they seem in any event to be separate—this is not, in other words, a polylingual motet. The original manuscripts instructions for performing the work direct that it be “sung by four companions, but, it should not be sung by fewer than three, or two at the least, in addition to those who sing the pes [that is, the rondellus in the two lower voices)” Theanonymous song Hai be thu, heven-gueene (“Blessed Be Thou, Heaven-Queen”) (ve {tisten also makes liberal use of thirds and sixths as consonant intervals. The rhythmic inter- €D2_Tiock pretation of this and similar songs of the 14h century is open to debate. Although ™Ysearehlab th tea siti the original source for this song, carefully aligns the two parts, it leaves ambiguous the iy pc hen queens duration of the notes. The version in the anthology follows the regular meters of the ScoeArtholay 29 text, although this is only one of several possibilities. Either or both parts could be performed vocally or instrumentally. INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC From written accounts and visual images—paintings and statues—we know that instruments played an important role in medieval music. They were routinely used to accompany or double vocal lines, and they were often used on theit own, indepen- dently of voices. Purely instrumental music entertained guests at banquets, accompa~ nied dancers, and signaled tcoops in batle. Instruments also found a place in religious :usic. The Book of Psalms provided ample justification for their use within the liturgy, | particularly this often-quored passage from Psalm 150: Praise him with the sound of the trampet: praise him with the psaltery and harp. Praise him with the timbrel and dance: praise him with stringed instru- | ‘ments and organs. Praise him upon the loud eymbals: praise him upon the high sounding cymbals. Atleast some church patriarchs were nevertheless uneasy about purely instramen- tal music. They considered music without a text to be transient and empty. A passage aaPaes long attributed to Saint Basil (a. 330-379), but probably writen by a different author, reflects a dismissive attitude toward purely instrumental music that would prevail for many centuries: ‘Now among the arts which are necessary to life, the goal of which js plain to see, there is carpentry and the chair, architecture and the house, shipbuilding and the ship, weaving and the cloak, forging and the blade; among the useless arts are cithara playing, dancing, aulos playing and all others whose product disappears when the activity ceases. Visual evidence nevertheless confirms that instruments—either alone or as accompaniment to singing—played an important role in medieval worship. Many medieval churches are adorned with carved images of musicians playing such diverse instruments as the vielle and rebec (bowed stringed instruments), lute, bells, trumpet, and organistrum (burdy-gurdy). And at least some medieval man- scripts inchide illustrations that show singers and instrumentalists performing together. ‘Unfortunately, very little medieval instrumental music was ever written down. Tt operated instead within an unwritten tradition, one that relied on memory and impro- visation. Composers rarely wrote music to be performed on specific instruments or by specific combinations of voices and instruments. Indeed, it would be difficult (and pointless) to draw a sharp distinction between vocal and instrumental music in medi- eval times. With the exception of plainchant and liturgical polyphony—elements of a sacred ritual whose words were of central importance—vocal and instrumental lines ‘were essentially interchangeable. Instruments could double voice lines or substitute for them altogether, as could voices for instruments. Musicians made ready use of ‘whatever instruments happened to be available at any given moment. In this sense i is impossible to reconstruct a single “correct” performance force for any given piece ‘of medieval music. Issues of medieval performance practice are better approached by taking into account the extraordinarily wide range of options open to musicians ofthis, time—to ask, in effect, whether or not a particular realization of a work is one that ‘might have taken place in this era ‘Among the earliest works that may have been conceived specifically for instru ments are a series of untested hockets that appear at the end ofa 13th-century manu- seript known as the Bamberg Codex. Scholars believe these works may have been ‘written with an eye toward instrumental performance because they lack a text in the upper voices. Several of these hockets are based on a tenor line derived from the same In saeculum passage of the Faster Gradual Hacc dies used in a number of early clausulbe. “The oldest surviving source of notated keyboard music—intended for the organ— dates from the early 14th century. The Robertsbridge Codex, a few sheets tucked into a larger manuscript, appears to have been copied in France sometime around 1320 ‘and consists of several dances, along with ornamented intabulations of some motets from Le Roman de Five An intabulation is an arrangement for keyboard or plucked string instrument (such a the lute) of a work originally written for voices. The Faenza Codex is a considerably more substantial collection of 96 folios copied in the early 15th century. Ie includes dances and intabulations of Mass movements, chansons, and Haalian madrigals. The highly embellished arrangement of Jacopo da Bologna’s Non al suo amante Example 3-7) gives some idea of the elaborate figuration to be found in this source.Waa eee EXAMPLE 3-7 arly notated keyboard music from the Faenza Codex. emp da Rologoa 1 i | | Sours: Opening of keyboard arrangement of Jacope da Bolognts Non al suo amante. Dragan Plamenao, 8, ‘Keyboard Music ofthe Late Middle Ages In tho Codex Faenee 117 (American atte of Musicology 172, - 88. Copyright American Musicological Society, 172 | The notated dance music of the medieval era is characterized by short repeated _(be/Listen sections called puncta (“points”). These modular units could be repeated, varied, and ¢D2.Tack® | embellished at will according wo the needs of the dance. The Quinte exampiereal("Fih marca Royal Estampc”), preserved in a French manuscript copied in the second half of the {NONWMOUS 13th century, illustrates the structural principles of medieval dance music in general. Score Artic 0 Each punctwm (“point”) is repeated immediately, with a first and then a second ending comparable to the oucert and clos of contemporary vocal forms. Here, the same pair of endings serves forall four puncts. Dances of this era were highly stylized, with elabo- rate steps executed at times by individual couples, at times by large groups dancing as a unit. The round dance is an example of the latter category: it called for a group of | dancers to hold hands and move in a circle with lively stepping. Dancing was a social activity practiced at all levels of society, from the nobles of the royal courts to the lowest peasants. By all accounts, the medieval eat relished contrasting timbres. This penchant fora mixture of sound colors matches well the layered counterpoint of 12th- and 1Bh-century voeal polyphony, with is clear delineation between a slow-moving tenor in the lowest register and fister-moving voices in the higher ranges. This tendency toward differentiation continued in the polyphony of the 14th century. Not until | the second half of the 15th century did a shift toward timbral homogeneity begin to emergehe basic instrument families that had been established in antiquity—strings, winds, percussion, and keyboard— | continued to evolve in the medieval era, Returning crusad- cers introduced many instruments from the Islamic world to the West, including the lute, guitar, rebec, and shawm. STRINGS. The two most common bowed string instru ‘ments of the medieval era were the vielle and the rebee. ‘The vielle was a distant forerunner of the violin but with a longer body and a fifth string that provided a drone, 1 rebec was a small pear-shaped instrument with three to five strings, sometimes with frets; it produced a rather thin, nasal sound. Plucked string instruments included | many varieties of harps, the luce, and the psaltery, a box zither of Arabic origin whose bronze strings could be plucked with the fingers or with quills. WINDS. Medieval wind instruments, like those of the ancient world, were made from animal homs, wood, or metal ‘The shawm, a double-reed instrument, played a prominent role in processions and dances. Recorders and flutes took: a variety of forms, including panpipes, whistles, and double pipes. ‘The medieval trumpet was a straight picce of tub ing without slides, valves, or finger holes. With a relatively restricted range, it was probably used mostly for fanfares ‘The slide trumpet, which appeared in the late medieval era, allowed the player to alter the length of the tubing by sliding the instrument back and forth against the stationary mouth- piece. This instrument, along with the shawm, i often seen. in contemporary illustrations of medieval dancing. t PERCUSSION. Medieval musicians used a variety of percussion instruments, including individual bells and sets of bells hung froma wooden frame and struck by hammers. Cymbals, timbrels, and other jingling instruments were algo quite popular, With a membrane stretched across its frame, the timbrel became a tambourine. Musicians also Fused drums of many shapes and sizes, from nakers (bowl- shaped drams rather like small kettledrums) to long drums (aller than they were wide) and side drums (wider than they were tall), The tabor was a small drum often played in conjunction with a pipe (whistle) by a single musician. KEYBOARD. The earliest known notated organ music, found in the Robertsbridge Codex of 1325, requires a full chromatic octave—that is, an octave divided into 12 half-steps. Bur the medieval organ had no stops— levers that could control the passage of ait through dif. ferent combinations of pipes—and thus could not project the kind of timbral variety associated with later organs. The = 90 * PART ONE portative organ, which could be transported easily, was the most common form of the instrument. The organistrum {also known as the s»mphona, of, more commonly, hurdy sgurdy), a stringed keyboard instrument, was stmaller and {ess complicated than the organ, and for that reason more Widely used. Its strings were activated by a rotating cylinder ‘of wood turned by a handle at one end; the length of the strings (and thus their pitch) was controlled by a simple key- board mechanism at the other end, Larger versions of the instrument required two players, one to turn the handle, the other to manipulate the keys. The organistrum was capable ‘of playing both a drone bass and a melody at the same time. HIGH AND LOW INSTRUMENTS. From the 14th century onward, writers often distinguished between two iain categories of instruments, “high” (alta) and “low” (bas), referting not to their register but to their dynamic level. High instruments included trumpets and horns, shawms, bagpipes, and drums. Low instruments included stringed instruments like the lute, ville, and rebee, of which only the former would survive into the Renaissance {King David and his musicians. n this image from an early-1th-century psaltor, King David, inspired by the Holy Spirit inthe form of a dove, plays the harp while the musicians sue rounding him play the ville (a bowed string instrament) and various wind instruments. Source: Ssh ibrariaksimagesfae - —————e | SUMMARY The music of the 14th century varied widely from place to place: France, Italy, and England all developed and cultivated their own distinctive idioms and genres. No single historical or musical event marks the end of the medieval era. But the sec- ond quarter of the 15th century witnessed a growing tendency toward simplified and homogeneous textures and a more carefully controlled use of dissonance. Isorhythm, although still cultivated, declined in importance as a structural device, and polytextual ‘motets gradually became the exception rather than the norm. All these stylistic devel- opments would eventually come to be associated with the era of musichistory we now fe-[Study and Review think of as the Renaissance. on mysearchlab.com