Elizabeth Eva Leach
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780801449338
- eISBN:
- 9781501704864
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9780801449338.003.0006
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
This chapter looks at the ultimate fortune of all humanity—death. Machaut's works do not just enact the symbolic lyrical deaths of male courtly lovers whose personae are clearly distinct from their ...
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This chapter looks at the ultimate fortune of all humanity—death. Machaut's works do not just enact the symbolic lyrical deaths of male courtly lovers whose personae are clearly distinct from their author. Of a piece with his pseudo-autobiographical self-presentation, Machaut presents a more personal fear of death in some of his narrative works, especially those that date from the latter part of his life. The chapter places Machaut's ostensibly secular works within the sacred, devotional, and moral-religious contexts that both he and his audiences inhabited. It integrates the role of music within the discussion of commemoration, including the commemoration of Machaut's own death, for which Eustache Deschamps wrote two balades, which were set to music by the contemporary composer F. Andrieu. The chapter ends with an examination of Machaut's immediate afterlife, reception, and ultimate neglect, bringing the narrative chronologically full circle to the point of his scholarly resurrection outlined in the second chapter.Less
This chapter looks at the ultimate fortune of all humanity—death. Machaut's works do not just enact the symbolic lyrical deaths of male courtly lovers whose personae are clearly distinct from their author. Of a piece with his pseudo-autobiographical self-presentation, Machaut presents a more personal fear of death in some of his narrative works, especially those that date from the latter part of his life. The chapter places Machaut's ostensibly secular works within the sacred, devotional, and moral-religious contexts that both he and his audiences inhabited. It integrates the role of music within the discussion of commemoration, including the commemoration of Machaut's own death, for which Eustache Deschamps wrote two balades, which were set to music by the contemporary composer F. Andrieu. The chapter ends with an examination of Machaut's immediate afterlife, reception, and ultimate neglect, bringing the narrative chronologically full circle to the point of his scholarly resurrection outlined in the second chapter.
Elizabeth Eva Leach
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780801449338
- eISBN:
- 9781501704864
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9780801449338.003.0001
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
This chapter reviews the surprisingly meager documentary evidence about Guillaume de Machaut's life. It attempts to satisfy two basic questions: What survives, and what does it tell us? The paper ...
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This chapter reviews the surprisingly meager documentary evidence about Guillaume de Machaut's life. It attempts to satisfy two basic questions: What survives, and what does it tell us? The paper trail—actually primarily a “skin trail,” since most of it is on parchment—comprises two main groups of sources. The first group includes discursive, literary writings, principally deluxe manuscripts of Machaut's own works, but also poetic treatises and literature by his contemporaries. The second encompasses various kinds of archival evidence, most pertaining to monetary aspects of Machaut's life such as employment, patronage, taxation, and the receipt of gifts. The chapter begins by describing both kinds of surviving material traces, starting, albeit briefly, with the manuscripts of Machaut's work. It then turns to the more factual documents which outline the current state of documented knowledge about Machaut's life while acknowledging that even factual documentation requires a degree of contextual interpretation. The chapter shows that far less is known about Machaut as a historical figure than most other studies have claimed.Less
This chapter reviews the surprisingly meager documentary evidence about Guillaume de Machaut's life. It attempts to satisfy two basic questions: What survives, and what does it tell us? The paper trail—actually primarily a “skin trail,” since most of it is on parchment—comprises two main groups of sources. The first group includes discursive, literary writings, principally deluxe manuscripts of Machaut's own works, but also poetic treatises and literature by his contemporaries. The second encompasses various kinds of archival evidence, most pertaining to monetary aspects of Machaut's life such as employment, patronage, taxation, and the receipt of gifts. The chapter begins by describing both kinds of surviving material traces, starting, albeit briefly, with the manuscripts of Machaut's work. It then turns to the more factual documents which outline the current state of documented knowledge about Machaut's life while acknowledging that even factual documentation requires a degree of contextual interpretation. The chapter shows that far less is known about Machaut as a historical figure than most other studies have claimed.
Elizabeth Eva Leach
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780801449338
- eISBN:
- 9781501704864
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9780801449338.003.0002
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
This chapter sketches the historiography of Machaut's rediscovery in the modern period, with the intent of positioning his oeuvre within the frameworks of each discipline's historically contingent ...
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This chapter sketches the historiography of Machaut's rediscovery in the modern period, with the intent of positioning his oeuvre within the frameworks of each discipline's historically contingent interpretations. The varied ways in which Machaut's works have been rediscovered, the aspects of them that have been points of focus, and their shifting evaluation and critical treatment betray a number of agendas that belong more to the modern scholarly community than to Machaut himself. Charting these agendas can help strip away the sometimes partisan concerns of the different branches of the modern academy; if this cannot ultimately reveal a pristine, authentically medieval Machaut, it can at least help form a more rounded picture of a figure who is, in our terms, toweringly interdisciplinary.Less
This chapter sketches the historiography of Machaut's rediscovery in the modern period, with the intent of positioning his oeuvre within the frameworks of each discipline's historically contingent interpretations. The varied ways in which Machaut's works have been rediscovered, the aspects of them that have been points of focus, and their shifting evaluation and critical treatment betray a number of agendas that belong more to the modern scholarly community than to Machaut himself. Charting these agendas can help strip away the sometimes partisan concerns of the different branches of the modern academy; if this cannot ultimately reveal a pristine, authentically medieval Machaut, it can at least help form a more rounded picture of a figure who is, in our terms, toweringly interdisciplinary.
Judith A. Peraino
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780199757244
- eISBN:
- 9780199918904
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199757244.003.0006
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
This chapter begins with the question: Why did Guillaume de Machaut write so many monophonic virelais? Of the thirty-three virelais, twenty-five are monophonic, while only eight are polyphonic (seven ...
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This chapter begins with the question: Why did Guillaume de Machaut write so many monophonic virelais? Of the thirty-three virelais, twenty-five are monophonic, while only eight are polyphonic (seven for two voices, one for three voices); even not counting these polyphonic virelais, the twenty-five monophonic virelais constitute the second most numerous genre in his musical oeuvre. The chapter examines the expressive meaning of both monophony and the virelai form, which is the only forme fixe to feature a substantial refrain, in the context of the Remede de Fortune, the Voir Dit, and his “collected works” manuscripts; and it considers their possible genealogical ties to Occitan dansas and their relationship to Machaut’s other monophonic—and decidedly archaic—genre, the lai. Furthermore, a series of Machaut’s lais alternate male and female voices, and a few but significant examples of his virelais follow suit. As both nostalgic and new, the monophonic virelai participates in Machaut’s programmatic exploration of the expressive lyric voice that also involves an exploration of the gendered voice.Less
This chapter begins with the question: Why did Guillaume de Machaut write so many monophonic virelais? Of the thirty-three virelais, twenty-five are monophonic, while only eight are polyphonic (seven for two voices, one for three voices); even not counting these polyphonic virelais, the twenty-five monophonic virelais constitute the second most numerous genre in his musical oeuvre. The chapter examines the expressive meaning of both monophony and the virelai form, which is the only forme fixe to feature a substantial refrain, in the context of the Remede de Fortune, the Voir Dit, and his “collected works” manuscripts; and it considers their possible genealogical ties to Occitan dansas and their relationship to Machaut’s other monophonic—and decidedly archaic—genre, the lai. Furthermore, a series of Machaut’s lais alternate male and female voices, and a few but significant examples of his virelais follow suit. As both nostalgic and new, the monophonic virelai participates in Machaut’s programmatic exploration of the expressive lyric voice that also involves an exploration of the gendered voice.
Elizabeth Eva Leach
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780801449338
- eISBN:
- 9781501704864
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9780801449338.003.0004
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
This chapter analyzes a related central plank in Machaut's doctrine of courtly love: Hope. One of the most compact statements of the power of Hope to be found in Machaut's works occurs in a balade ...
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This chapter analyzes a related central plank in Machaut's doctrine of courtly love: Hope. One of the most compact statements of the power of Hope to be found in Machaut's works occurs in a balade that appears only in the music section of his works: Esperance (B13). The balades preceding B13 in the music section culminate in Pour ce que tous (B12), whose self-conscious singer threatens to stop composing and singing songs, asserting repeatedly, “Je chant mains que ne sueil” (I sing less than I used to). B13 cures and cancels the despair of B12 with the introduction of the figure that forms its opening word: “Esperance” (Hope). The situation with respect to the lady remains unchanged: the lady of B13 similarly has not reciprocated, but the presence of Hope reconfigures the sorrow of B12 as joy and enables the composition and singing of balades (as well as the copying and reading of them) to continue.Less
This chapter analyzes a related central plank in Machaut's doctrine of courtly love: Hope. One of the most compact statements of the power of Hope to be found in Machaut's works occurs in a balade that appears only in the music section of his works: Esperance (B13). The balades preceding B13 in the music section culminate in Pour ce que tous (B12), whose self-conscious singer threatens to stop composing and singing songs, asserting repeatedly, “Je chant mains que ne sueil” (I sing less than I used to). B13 cures and cancels the despair of B12 with the introduction of the figure that forms its opening word: “Esperance” (Hope). The situation with respect to the lady remains unchanged: the lady of B13 similarly has not reciprocated, but the presence of Hope reconfigures the sorrow of B12 as joy and enables the composition and singing of balades (as well as the copying and reading of them) to continue.
Elizabeth Eva Leach
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780801449338
- eISBN:
- 9781501704864
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9780801449338.003.0003
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
Some of the blame for the too easy mapping of fictional truth onto historical reality that derives from what we know about Machaut can be attributed to the mischievous manipulation of personal truth ...
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Some of the blame for the too easy mapping of fictional truth onto historical reality that derives from what we know about Machaut can be attributed to the mischievous manipulation of personal truth by the man himself. This chapter considers Machaut's presentation of his authorial persona by examining the Prologue to his works. This poem outlines a poetics within which Machaut's status as a poet and—perhaps more surprisingly, given the Prologue's lack of musical notation—a musician are central. In addition, the Prologue's paired images emphasize the wholeness of Machaut's book and the importance of making connections between its parts, leading the reader to appreciate a poetics that is as scribal as it is musical. The chapter goes on to explore the way in which Machaut linked his art, life, and truth through his own particular take on the necessity of composing in line with one's own sentement (emotional authenticity).Less
Some of the blame for the too easy mapping of fictional truth onto historical reality that derives from what we know about Machaut can be attributed to the mischievous manipulation of personal truth by the man himself. This chapter considers Machaut's presentation of his authorial persona by examining the Prologue to his works. This poem outlines a poetics within which Machaut's status as a poet and—perhaps more surprisingly, given the Prologue's lack of musical notation—a musician are central. In addition, the Prologue's paired images emphasize the wholeness of Machaut's book and the importance of making connections between its parts, leading the reader to appreciate a poetics that is as scribal as it is musical. The chapter goes on to explore the way in which Machaut linked his art, life, and truth through his own particular take on the necessity of composing in line with one's own sentement (emotional authenticity).
Elizabeth Eva Leach
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780801449338
- eISBN:
- 9781501704864
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9780801449338.003.0005
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
Hope is central to Machaut's courtly doctrine, since it enables the lover to operate at a level of self-sufficiency whatever might be happening in the world outside his own imagination. Hope is ...
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Hope is central to Machaut's courtly doctrine, since it enables the lover to operate at a level of self-sufficiency whatever might be happening in the world outside his own imagination. Hope is presented as the “remede de Fortune,” the remedy for mischance, the cure for ill luck. In Machaut's works Fortune is always a negative force, in whose power the desiring subject lies unless mental efforts in forging a primary relationship with Hope place him or her beyond it. Machaut's Fortune is modeled after the traditional representation of the goddess, drawing largely on the pagan version impersonated by Lady Philosophy in Boethius' Consolation, book 2. Following the imprecations of Hope in the Remede, this chapter seeks to understand the workings of Fortune through an examination of several of her multiple presentations in Machaut's music and poetry.Less
Hope is central to Machaut's courtly doctrine, since it enables the lover to operate at a level of self-sufficiency whatever might be happening in the world outside his own imagination. Hope is presented as the “remede de Fortune,” the remedy for mischance, the cure for ill luck. In Machaut's works Fortune is always a negative force, in whose power the desiring subject lies unless mental efforts in forging a primary relationship with Hope place him or her beyond it. Machaut's Fortune is modeled after the traditional representation of the goddess, drawing largely on the pagan version impersonated by Lady Philosophy in Boethius' Consolation, book 2. Following the imprecations of Hope in the Remede, this chapter seeks to understand the workings of Fortune through an examination of several of her multiple presentations in Machaut's music and poetry.
Yolanda Plumley
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199915088
- eISBN:
- 9780199369713
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199915088.003.0011
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
This explores how playful citational exchange animates Machaut's great mature work of the early 1360s, Le Livre dou Voir Dit. Here citational engagement in lyric exchanges orchestrates the burgeoning ...
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This explores how playful citational exchange animates Machaut's great mature work of the early 1360s, Le Livre dou Voir Dit. Here citational engagement in lyric exchanges orchestrates the burgeoning love affair between the poet-narrator and his young admirer at the center of the plot. It also is at the heart of a more “professional” lyric skirmish with one of the author's real-life associates, Thomas Paien. The chapter concludes by exploring a network of interrelated lyrics and songs that were apparently spawned by Machaut's contribution to the latter (Quant Theseus / Ne quier veoir, Ballade 34). It is suggested that some of this collection of interrelated works might have been staged at an informal puy, perhaps for Jehan, duke of Berry. This case study offers a glimpse of the artistic milieu within which the poet-composer operated. It also offers insights into how his peers—and, possibly, his patrons—engaged with, and responded to, his compositions.Less
This explores how playful citational exchange animates Machaut's great mature work of the early 1360s, Le Livre dou Voir Dit. Here citational engagement in lyric exchanges orchestrates the burgeoning love affair between the poet-narrator and his young admirer at the center of the plot. It also is at the heart of a more “professional” lyric skirmish with one of the author's real-life associates, Thomas Paien. The chapter concludes by exploring a network of interrelated lyrics and songs that were apparently spawned by Machaut's contribution to the latter (Quant Theseus / Ne quier veoir, Ballade 34). It is suggested that some of this collection of interrelated works might have been staged at an informal puy, perhaps for Jehan, duke of Berry. This case study offers a glimpse of the artistic milieu within which the poet-composer operated. It also offers insights into how his peers—and, possibly, his patrons—engaged with, and responded to, his compositions.
Judith A. Peraino
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780199757244
- eISBN:
- 9780199918904
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199757244.001.0001
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
This study focuses on monophonic “courtly love” songs from roughly 1100 to the 1350s. These songs present a paradox: they conceive and express the autonomous subject—the lyric “I” represented by a ...
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This study focuses on monophonic “courtly love” songs from roughly 1100 to the 1350s. These songs present a paradox: they conceive and express the autonomous subject—the lyric “I” represented by a single line of melody—yet they also engage highly conventional musical and poetic language. The lyrics are characteristically self-conscious, reflecting on the particular materials and event of their making, while acknowledging the irreducibly social conditions for self-expression. This book investigates similar self-consciousness in the musical settings, especially in moments and examples where voice, melody, rhythm, form, and genre come dramatically to the fore and seem to comment on music itself. Chapter 1 examines tornadas and envois, which directly confront the paradox of self-expression with their abrupt change of voice and address and a musical turn to the middle of the stanza. Many of the pieces I consider in the subsequent chapters—descorts, recomposed mensural chansons, monophonic motets, and Machaut’s virelais—have the quality of belatedness: they are monophonic songs written at a time when such monophony was being replaced by formes fixes and polyphonic motets. In the ongoing development of monophony, composers (mostly unnamed) combined backward- and forward-looking characteristics, fusing newer melodic, rhythmic, and refrain procedures with older monophonic idioms and genres of the troubadours and trouvères to construct a unique musical voice. These late melodies, often neglected by scholars, have much to tell us about musical responses to the courtly chanson tradition.Less
This study focuses on monophonic “courtly love” songs from roughly 1100 to the 1350s. These songs present a paradox: they conceive and express the autonomous subject—the lyric “I” represented by a single line of melody—yet they also engage highly conventional musical and poetic language. The lyrics are characteristically self-conscious, reflecting on the particular materials and event of their making, while acknowledging the irreducibly social conditions for self-expression. This book investigates similar self-consciousness in the musical settings, especially in moments and examples where voice, melody, rhythm, form, and genre come dramatically to the fore and seem to comment on music itself. Chapter 1 examines tornadas and envois, which directly confront the paradox of self-expression with their abrupt change of voice and address and a musical turn to the middle of the stanza. Many of the pieces I consider in the subsequent chapters—descorts, recomposed mensural chansons, monophonic motets, and Machaut’s virelais—have the quality of belatedness: they are monophonic songs written at a time when such monophony was being replaced by formes fixes and polyphonic motets. In the ongoing development of monophony, composers (mostly unnamed) combined backward- and forward-looking characteristics, fusing newer melodic, rhythmic, and refrain procedures with older monophonic idioms and genres of the troubadours and trouvères to construct a unique musical voice. These late melodies, often neglected by scholars, have much to tell us about musical responses to the courtly chanson tradition.
Yolanda Plumley
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199915088
- eISBN:
- 9780199369713
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199915088.003.0009
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
Part Three is devoted to citational practice in Machaut's lyrics and songs. Chapter Eight traces the sources for his borrowings and reveals that he plumbed material from both peers and predecessors. ...
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Part Three is devoted to citational practice in Machaut's lyrics and songs. Chapter Eight traces the sources for his borrowings and reveals that he plumbed material from both peers and predecessors. His engagement with Jehan de Le Mote is reflected in some of his earliest ballades and these cases potentially hold valuable information about the dating of Machaut's earliest polyphonic songs; it is argued here that Machaut was quoting his peer rather than the reverse, suggesting his earliest polyphonic ballades were written after 1339. Other of Machaut's appropriations show that trouvère songs were still alive in the lyric imagination of the poet-composer and his audience; Machaut quoted music and text from songs known to us from Oxford Bodleian, MS Douce 308, and we encounter, too, textual reminiscences of songs by the Chastelain de Couci. In addition to such targeted citations, Machaut's lyrics abound with familiar refrains, proverbs and other commonplaces. This demonstrates that, for all their novelty, his lyrics and songs display strong elements of continuity with the earlier vernacular tradition.Less
Part Three is devoted to citational practice in Machaut's lyrics and songs. Chapter Eight traces the sources for his borrowings and reveals that he plumbed material from both peers and predecessors. His engagement with Jehan de Le Mote is reflected in some of his earliest ballades and these cases potentially hold valuable information about the dating of Machaut's earliest polyphonic songs; it is argued here that Machaut was quoting his peer rather than the reverse, suggesting his earliest polyphonic ballades were written after 1339. Other of Machaut's appropriations show that trouvère songs were still alive in the lyric imagination of the poet-composer and his audience; Machaut quoted music and text from songs known to us from Oxford Bodleian, MS Douce 308, and we encounter, too, textual reminiscences of songs by the Chastelain de Couci. In addition to such targeted citations, Machaut's lyrics abound with familiar refrains, proverbs and other commonplaces. This demonstrates that, for all their novelty, his lyrics and songs display strong elements of continuity with the earlier vernacular tradition.
Yolanda Plumley
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199915088
- eISBN:
- 9780199369713
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199915088.003.0007
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
This chapter turns to another little studied contemporary of Machaut, Jehan de Le Mote, who, like Watriquet de Couvin, hailed from Hainaut but pursued his career in Paris. His lyrics, which survive ...
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This chapter turns to another little studied contemporary of Machaut, Jehan de Le Mote, who, like Watriquet de Couvin, hailed from Hainaut but pursued his career in Paris. His lyrics, which survive without music, provide direct comparison with Machaut's and offer important insights into how the ballade form had evolved by ca. 1340 when Machaut likely started composing his own examples. His surviving lyrics reveal that citation was a key element of the ballade in its up-to-date guise. Le Mote was celebrated as one of the leading composers of the day, along with Machaut and Philippe de Vitry, with whom he enjoyed ongoing lyric exchanges. Some citations uncovered in two anonymous musical works, a motet and a chanson, permit a new assessment of Le Mote's significance as a composer and offer some rare glimpses into the kind of music he probably wrote.Less
This chapter turns to another little studied contemporary of Machaut, Jehan de Le Mote, who, like Watriquet de Couvin, hailed from Hainaut but pursued his career in Paris. His lyrics, which survive without music, provide direct comparison with Machaut's and offer important insights into how the ballade form had evolved by ca. 1340 when Machaut likely started composing his own examples. His surviving lyrics reveal that citation was a key element of the ballade in its up-to-date guise. Le Mote was celebrated as one of the leading composers of the day, along with Machaut and Philippe de Vitry, with whom he enjoyed ongoing lyric exchanges. Some citations uncovered in two anonymous musical works, a motet and a chanson, permit a new assessment of Le Mote's significance as a composer and offer some rare glimpses into the kind of music he probably wrote.
Elizabeth Eva Leach
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780195384581
- eISBN:
- 9780199918331
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195384581.003.0002
- Subject:
- Music, Ethnomusicology, World Music
This chapter presents an analysis of Guillaume de Machaut’s balade De petit po (B18). Taking an understanding of medieval counterpoint as its starting point, the analysis treats the two central ...
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This chapter presents an analysis of Guillaume de Machaut’s balade De petit po (B18). Taking an understanding of medieval counterpoint as its starting point, the analysis treats the two central contrapuntal voices first before examining the response to these voices provided variously by the (mutually exclusive) triplum and contratenor parts. Ultimately the analysis inflects a consideration of the balade’s performance contexts, which serve as a means of simultaneously presenting and commentating on its verbal text.Less
This chapter presents an analysis of Guillaume de Machaut’s balade De petit po (B18). Taking an understanding of medieval counterpoint as its starting point, the analysis treats the two central contrapuntal voices first before examining the response to these voices provided variously by the (mutually exclusive) triplum and contratenor parts. Ultimately the analysis inflects a consideration of the balade’s performance contexts, which serve as a means of simultaneously presenting and commentating on its verbal text.
Yolanda Plumley
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199915088
- eISBN:
- 9780199369713
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199915088.001.0001
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
Fourteenth-century France witnessed the emergence of a new school of lyric, as the so-called formes fixes crystallized and the Ars nova revolutionized musical practice. Charting the emergence of this ...
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Fourteenth-century France witnessed the emergence of a new school of lyric, as the so-called formes fixes crystallized and the Ars nova revolutionized musical practice. Charting the emergence of this new lyric order from ca. 1300 to ca. 1380, The Art of Grafted Song demonstrates that despite these new departures, the long-established principle of borrowing within French lyric continued to inspire poets and composers. Cutting across disciplinary boundaries, this study traces citation, quotation, allusion, and other kinds of appropriations in fourteenth-century lyrics with and without music to build a more intimate understanding of song at this time and of the shared experience of poetry and music. It argues that citational practice was integral to experiments in form, genre, and style that gave rise to the new tradition. Exploring textual and musical reminiscences enhances our understanding of how poets and composers devised their works and engaged one another and their audiences in formal contests or puys and in informal lyric displays, and casts light on the reception and circulation of individual works. It also provides valuable clues about when, where, and in which milieus the polyphonic chanson and its sister lyric forms emerged and flourished. It reveals that older works often persisted longer in the shared imagination than we tend to suppose; we learn, too, about attitudes to authorship and the importance of memory in this age of literacy. All this enables us to better contextualize the contribution of Guillaume de Machaut, who is traditionally viewed as the great pioneer of lyric composition in this period, shedding light on his compositional process, on what he learned from his predecessors, and how he honed his art in response to his contemporaries.Less
Fourteenth-century France witnessed the emergence of a new school of lyric, as the so-called formes fixes crystallized and the Ars nova revolutionized musical practice. Charting the emergence of this new lyric order from ca. 1300 to ca. 1380, The Art of Grafted Song demonstrates that despite these new departures, the long-established principle of borrowing within French lyric continued to inspire poets and composers. Cutting across disciplinary boundaries, this study traces citation, quotation, allusion, and other kinds of appropriations in fourteenth-century lyrics with and without music to build a more intimate understanding of song at this time and of the shared experience of poetry and music. It argues that citational practice was integral to experiments in form, genre, and style that gave rise to the new tradition. Exploring textual and musical reminiscences enhances our understanding of how poets and composers devised their works and engaged one another and their audiences in formal contests or puys and in informal lyric displays, and casts light on the reception and circulation of individual works. It also provides valuable clues about when, where, and in which milieus the polyphonic chanson and its sister lyric forms emerged and flourished. It reveals that older works often persisted longer in the shared imagination than we tend to suppose; we learn, too, about attitudes to authorship and the importance of memory in this age of literacy. All this enables us to better contextualize the contribution of Guillaume de Machaut, who is traditionally viewed as the great pioneer of lyric composition in this period, shedding light on his compositional process, on what he learned from his predecessors, and how he honed his art in response to his contemporaries.
Burt Kimmelman
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780813062419
- eISBN:
- 9780813053080
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Florida
- DOI:
- 10.5744/florida/9780813062419.003.0005
- Subject:
- Literature, Early and Medieval Literature
This chapter analyzes Guillaume de Machaut’s legacy as inherited by Geoffrey Chaucer and Christine de Pizan, especially in the context of a conceptualization of both Machaut the poet and his poetry ...
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This chapter analyzes Guillaume de Machaut’s legacy as inherited by Geoffrey Chaucer and Christine de Pizan, especially in the context of a conceptualization of both Machaut the poet and his poetry as cultural capital. Machaut’s judgment poems are paired with his Le Confort d’ami and La Fonteinne amoureuse in order to establish a basis for the younger poets’ literary strategies that constitute, beyond their writings’ aesthetics, sociopolitical acts that embody intentions going beyond poetics per se. Through a discussion of a number of the younger’ poets’ works—Geoffrey’s “Wordes unto Adam, His Owne Scriveyn” and the Prologue to the Legend of Good Women; and Christine’s Cent ballades d’amant et des dames, Epistre au dieu d’amours, Livre de Trois Vertus, and other writings—the chapter argues that Machaut created a scene of writing for Chaucer and Christine to enter into, thus entering a new world in which even if the status of the patron is not diminished, that of the poet is elevated through writing in both literary and political realms. The poetics of authorship as Machaut both inherited and further developed, reaches its pinnacle in the younger French poet’s work as she is seen both as poet and political thinker.Less
This chapter analyzes Guillaume de Machaut’s legacy as inherited by Geoffrey Chaucer and Christine de Pizan, especially in the context of a conceptualization of both Machaut the poet and his poetry as cultural capital. Machaut’s judgment poems are paired with his Le Confort d’ami and La Fonteinne amoureuse in order to establish a basis for the younger poets’ literary strategies that constitute, beyond their writings’ aesthetics, sociopolitical acts that embody intentions going beyond poetics per se. Through a discussion of a number of the younger’ poets’ works—Geoffrey’s “Wordes unto Adam, His Owne Scriveyn” and the Prologue to the Legend of Good Women; and Christine’s Cent ballades d’amant et des dames, Epistre au dieu d’amours, Livre de Trois Vertus, and other writings—the chapter argues that Machaut created a scene of writing for Chaucer and Christine to enter into, thus entering a new world in which even if the status of the patron is not diminished, that of the poet is elevated through writing in both literary and political realms. The poetics of authorship as Machaut both inherited and further developed, reaches its pinnacle in the younger French poet’s work as she is seen both as poet and political thinker.
Elizabeth Eva Leach
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780801449338
- eISBN:
- 9781501704864
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9780801449338.003.0007
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
This introductory chapter sets out the book's purpose, which is to reflect on the centrality of music within Guillaume de Machaut's poetry and poetics by integrating discussion of his songs into a ...
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This introductory chapter sets out the book's purpose, which is to reflect on the centrality of music within Guillaume de Machaut's poetry and poetics by integrating discussion of his songs into a thematic treatment of his works. As a man who was at once a secretary, poet, and musician, Machaut is important in historical, literary, and musical terms. But these kinds of importance represent three discrete faculties in the modern university, so the modern divisions of scholarship serve Machaut's highly integrated output badly. The book attempts to reintegrate the various strands of scholarly treatment in order to present a more complete picture of Machaut as a creative artist. In particular it is designed to bring the discussion of the musical works more centrally into a consideration of Machaut's poetic themes, to show that music functions variously to enshrine and transform them. An overview of the subsequent is also presented.Less
This introductory chapter sets out the book's purpose, which is to reflect on the centrality of music within Guillaume de Machaut's poetry and poetics by integrating discussion of his songs into a thematic treatment of his works. As a man who was at once a secretary, poet, and musician, Machaut is important in historical, literary, and musical terms. But these kinds of importance represent three discrete faculties in the modern university, so the modern divisions of scholarship serve Machaut's highly integrated output badly. The book attempts to reintegrate the various strands of scholarly treatment in order to present a more complete picture of Machaut as a creative artist. In particular it is designed to bring the discussion of the musical works more centrally into a consideration of Machaut's poetic themes, to show that music functions variously to enshrine and transform them. An overview of the subsequent is also presented.
Elizaveta Strakhov
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780813062419
- eISBN:
- 9780813053080
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Florida
- DOI:
- 10.5744/florida/9780813062419.003.0006
- Subject:
- Literature, Early and Medieval Literature
This chapter examines Guillaume de Machaut’s and Geoffrey Chaucer’s association of the color blue with fidelity and green with infidelity, a color scheme that derives from contemporary heraldry. The ...
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This chapter examines Guillaume de Machaut’s and Geoffrey Chaucer’s association of the color blue with fidelity and green with infidelity, a color scheme that derives from contemporary heraldry. The mid- to late fourteenth century witnessed a marked surge in the number of people commissioning coats of arms; this phenomenon lead to a number of high-profile lawsuits over cases of mistaken and fraudulent armigerous identity. Chaucer himself was a witness in one of these, Scrope v. Grosvenor (1385–1391). Machaut’s and Chaucer’s use of this metaphor is read through these lawsuits to show that the two poets use heraldic color to explore issues surrounding legal identity and social reputation in their texts. Delving into the historical relationship between heraldic law and intellectual property law, the chapter further shows that both poets use these colors to figure concerns over their authorial reputations and intellectual property.Less
This chapter examines Guillaume de Machaut’s and Geoffrey Chaucer’s association of the color blue with fidelity and green with infidelity, a color scheme that derives from contemporary heraldry. The mid- to late fourteenth century witnessed a marked surge in the number of people commissioning coats of arms; this phenomenon lead to a number of high-profile lawsuits over cases of mistaken and fraudulent armigerous identity. Chaucer himself was a witness in one of these, Scrope v. Grosvenor (1385–1391). Machaut’s and Chaucer’s use of this metaphor is read through these lawsuits to show that the two poets use heraldic color to explore issues surrounding legal identity and social reputation in their texts. Delving into the historical relationship between heraldic law and intellectual property law, the chapter further shows that both poets use these colors to figure concerns over their authorial reputations and intellectual property.
Emma Cayley
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780813062419
- eISBN:
- 9780813053080
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Florida
- DOI:
- 10.5744/florida/9780813062419.003.0003
- Subject:
- Literature, Early and Medieval Literature
This chapter addresses questions of literary and political authority in the writings of two of medieval France’s best known authors, Alain Chartier (c.1385–1430) and Guillaume de Machaut (1300–1377). ...
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This chapter addresses questions of literary and political authority in the writings of two of medieval France’s best known authors, Alain Chartier (c.1385–1430) and Guillaume de Machaut (1300–1377). Chartier was steeped in a rich culture of literary, political, and intellectual debate. His literary debates are heavily inflected by Machaut’s judgment poems. Chartier and Machaut’s positioning within the tradition of the reception of their works marks them as authority figures, or “sites” of authority, and that authority is paradoxically reinforced by textual and material attempts to erase it. In Machaut's “Judgement of the King of Navarre” (1349), the personification of Discretion urges the king of Navarre, appointed judge, to “le contraire effacies” (erase the opposite, v. 3432), or in other words perhaps: to spin the debate to give the desired outcome.Less
This chapter addresses questions of literary and political authority in the writings of two of medieval France’s best known authors, Alain Chartier (c.1385–1430) and Guillaume de Machaut (1300–1377). Chartier was steeped in a rich culture of literary, political, and intellectual debate. His literary debates are heavily inflected by Machaut’s judgment poems. Chartier and Machaut’s positioning within the tradition of the reception of their works marks them as authority figures, or “sites” of authority, and that authority is paradoxically reinforced by textual and material attempts to erase it. In Machaut's “Judgement of the King of Navarre” (1349), the personification of Discretion urges the king of Navarre, appointed judge, to “le contraire effacies” (erase the opposite, v. 3432), or in other words perhaps: to spin the debate to give the desired outcome.
Elizabeth Eva Leach
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- August 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780801449338
- eISBN:
- 9781501704864
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9780801449338.001.0001
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
At once a royal secretary, a poet, and a composer, Guillaume de Machaut was one of the most protean and creative figures of the late Middle Ages. Rather than focus on a single strand of his ...
More
At once a royal secretary, a poet, and a composer, Guillaume de Machaut was one of the most protean and creative figures of the late Middle Ages. Rather than focus on a single strand of his remarkable career, the book encompasses all aspects of his work, illuminating it in a distinctively interdisciplinary light. It provides a comprehensive picture of Machaut's artistry; reviews the documentary evidence about his life; charts the different agendas pursued by modern scholarly disciplines in their rediscovery and use of specific parts of his output; and delineates Machaut's own poetic and material presentation of his authorial persona. The book details Machaut's central poetic themes of hope, fortune, and death, integrating the aspect of Machaut's multimedia art that differentiates him from his contemporaries' treatment of similar thematic issues: music. In restoring the centrality of music in Machaut's poetics, arguing that his words cannot be truly understood or appreciated without the additional layers of meaning created in their musicalization, the book makes a compelling argument that musico-literary performance occupied a special place in the courts of fourteenth-century France.Less
At once a royal secretary, a poet, and a composer, Guillaume de Machaut was one of the most protean and creative figures of the late Middle Ages. Rather than focus on a single strand of his remarkable career, the book encompasses all aspects of his work, illuminating it in a distinctively interdisciplinary light. It provides a comprehensive picture of Machaut's artistry; reviews the documentary evidence about his life; charts the different agendas pursued by modern scholarly disciplines in their rediscovery and use of specific parts of his output; and delineates Machaut's own poetic and material presentation of his authorial persona. The book details Machaut's central poetic themes of hope, fortune, and death, integrating the aspect of Machaut's multimedia art that differentiates him from his contemporaries' treatment of similar thematic issues: music. In restoring the centrality of music in Machaut's poetics, arguing that his words cannot be truly understood or appreciated without the additional layers of meaning created in their musicalization, the book makes a compelling argument that musico-literary performance occupied a special place in the courts of fourteenth-century France.
Yolanda Plumley
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199915088
- eISBN:
- 9780199369713
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199915088.003.0010
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
Machaut's fixed-form lyrics feature a multitude of recurrences: recurrent phrases and even whole lines litter his song-texts and unnotated lyrics. This chapter explores how Machaut exploited the art ...
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Machaut's fixed-form lyrics feature a multitude of recurrences: recurrent phrases and even whole lines litter his song-texts and unnotated lyrics. This chapter explores how Machaut exploited the art of self-citation in his collection of unnotated lyrics known as La Loange des dames: here Machaut became his own authority in the art of love-through-lyric. Case studies illustrate how he replicated material to construct new lyrics and to create interrelated pairs or even intertextual sequences of works. Recent scholarship has explored ordering in medieval anthologies, and interpretations of Machaut's lyric output have been strongly influenced by prevailing ideas regarding the author's self-conscious desire to guide his readers through his written oeuvre; it is argued here that the patterns of citational play in La Loange des dames suggest he was happy for its lyrics to be savored individually or in small, interrelated groups.Less
Machaut's fixed-form lyrics feature a multitude of recurrences: recurrent phrases and even whole lines litter his song-texts and unnotated lyrics. This chapter explores how Machaut exploited the art of self-citation in his collection of unnotated lyrics known as La Loange des dames: here Machaut became his own authority in the art of love-through-lyric. Case studies illustrate how he replicated material to construct new lyrics and to create interrelated pairs or even intertextual sequences of works. Recent scholarship has explored ordering in medieval anthologies, and interpretations of Machaut's lyric output have been strongly influenced by prevailing ideas regarding the author's self-conscious desire to guide his readers through his written oeuvre; it is argued here that the patterns of citational play in La Loange des dames suggest he was happy for its lyrics to be savored individually or in small, interrelated groups.
Yolanda Plumley
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199915088
- eISBN:
- 9780199369713
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199915088.003.0012
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
This argues that “grafted song” enlightens us about attitudes to authorship and canonicity in this age of self-conscious new departures; poets and composers like Machaut were keen to stress their ...
More
This argues that “grafted song” enlightens us about attitudes to authorship and canonicity in this age of self-conscious new departures; poets and composers like Machaut were keen to stress their authorial identity but also to align themselves with past traditions and predecessors and to situate themselves in relation to their peers. Although, surprisingly, Machaut's lyrics and songs did not circulate in great number outside the complete-works manuscripts, his renown can be gauged by their reception. Certain of his own works became the subject of borrowings by his younger contemporaries and immediate successors in France, the north, and in Italy. Just as formalized lyric exchanges and the compilation of lyric cycles grew popular among poets, the post-Machaut generation of song-writers, including those of Ars subtilior, continued the tradition of citational engagement within the chanson, even as they endeavored to extend the boundaries of musical style.Less
This argues that “grafted song” enlightens us about attitudes to authorship and canonicity in this age of self-conscious new departures; poets and composers like Machaut were keen to stress their authorial identity but also to align themselves with past traditions and predecessors and to situate themselves in relation to their peers. Although, surprisingly, Machaut's lyrics and songs did not circulate in great number outside the complete-works manuscripts, his renown can be gauged by their reception. Certain of his own works became the subject of borrowings by his younger contemporaries and immediate successors in France, the north, and in Italy. Just as formalized lyric exchanges and the compilation of lyric cycles grew popular among poets, the post-Machaut generation of song-writers, including those of Ars subtilior, continued the tradition of citational engagement within the chanson, even as they endeavored to extend the boundaries of musical style.
