Guillaume de Machaut
/ca 1300-1377/
Guillaume
de Machaut
/ca 1300-1377/
The great French
poet-musician's relation to Bohemia stands for an
interesting problem. For about 20 years he was a loyal secretary of
John of Luxembourg, the King of Bohemia. We know he was writing both
poetry and music even at that time. Why not to believe then that his
songs resounded at the Prague court and influenced Czech musicians?
However, Machaut's frequent travelling throughout Europe did not allow
him to compose much, his stays in Bohemia were short and rare, and
there were no conditions for cultivating his too complicated art in our
countries. In spite of that we suppose that Bohemian milieu overhear
the music of the new style — whether Machaut's compositions or those by
some unknown authors or from echoes among wandering minstrels. About
1330 a chronicler mentioned among the "new fashion in manners" also
popular polyphonic singing-to-dance the roots of which gave the growth
even to the artificial stylisation of Machaut's song compositions.
These first movest were developed even more extensively in the era of
the King and Emperor Charles IV. whose 600th death anniversary we
commemorate this year.
Machaut's work grew out of a remarkable epoch of the French ars
nova and it owns both its style innovations and developing
the new aesthetics. The new features of Machaut's courtly love lyrics
are not only in asserting the accompanied polyphonic style but, at the
same time, in the art of poetically programmatic composing. The joyful virelai
(#1), the romantically singable ballades (#2,
3, 6) and pathetically melancholy in #11
connect the music and poetry nearly in a modern way. Some of the
Machaut's miniatures are also experiments: #4 is a
three-part canon, #12 involves a retrograde motion,
#5 uses isorhythm. The motet was the domain of
isorhythm the rationality of which was not self-purposed, but a
framework that bore up a rapidly moving complementary two-part duet —
the dialogue whose symbolic meaning in #10 is a
meditation on "Pride and Envy make people the wolfish beasts". — In the
Ballade on Death of G. de Machaut the younger artists expressed their
respect for the great figure of "the noble poet".
Dr. Jaromír Černý
I took over the
three-part Machaut's hoquet
David
without any modification in a musical substance. Just destroying its
inner melody by voice-exchanges and voice-crossing I drew this music
nearer my own feeling.
I established the ARS CAMERALIS ensemble being a student at the Prague
Conservatory of Music. I have always wished to have the opportunity to
make public acquainted with not very known music in which singing is
accompanied by several instruments. It is typical of our ensemble that
it often confronts just the two musical epochs — so distant in time and
so close in many aspects — the Middle Ages and the Present. About 30
compositions have been composed for our ensemble by many authors. Ars
Cameralis performs in concert halls, radio, TV, at festivals
both at home and abroad.
This record has its source in admiration for the great medieval
composer. Its intention is to express a great respect for Machaut's
varied and impressive work and at the same time we enjoy inspirating
power of Machaut's music which can provoke the authors of our time.
Lukáš Matoušek
The Gallant
songs dedicated to the Ars
Cameralis
ensemble date back to 1978. This three-song cycle has a clean-cut
bearing in expression and style which arises from the character of the
literary model — the verse of Wenceslas of Luxembourg, brother of
Charles IV., the King of Bohemia and the Roman Emperor. Wenceslas, the
Duke of Luxembourg and Brabant who became famous as poets' and artists'
maecenas. His French poems belong to the courtly love poetry of the
late Middle Ages. Setting them to music I tried to keep their specific
gallant poetry atmosphere including its typical conventionalism of
ideas, emotions and forms and to express that all by means of modern
song lyrics. That was the origin of the monothematically
through-composed cycle the aim of which is to speak to a contemporary
listener about nobility of human feeling which must often stand
difficult life proofs.
Václav Kučera
The cycle Maitre
Machaut in Bohemia for
female voice, flute, clarinet, viola and piano, initiated by the Ars
Cameralis
ensemble for the coming 600th anniversary of the death of the great
French composer Guillaume de Machaut whose relation to our countries
and culture is well known, was composed in 1975.
The movements of the cycle form genre pictures from Machaut's journey
and stay in Bohemia. A short introductory passage expresses wonder of
coming Machaut. The second movement is a combination of modern polka
and medieval hoquet technique. The third movement quotes the Smetana's
theme of Vyšehrad and the text "Praga — caput regni
Bohemiae" is set in the manner of chasse
— the canon of the Machaut's era. The fourth movement is a sort of a
musical vocabulary for Machaut who learns Czech musical terms and their
Latin counterparts. This movement uses timbre tuned sequences with
prevailing singing. The cycle is closed by epilogue, similar to the
introductory number, with the text "O vale, Bohemia!"
Dr. Miloš Štědroň