Guillaume de Machaut
Chansons • Písně
Ars Cameralis


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matous.cz
medieval.org
muziekweb.nl

1996
Studio Matouš MK 0027

září a listopad 1995
Farní sbor Církve českobratrské evangelické, Praha




Guillaume de Machaut

1 - Moult sui de bonne heure nee (virelai)   [3:39]
Mezzosoprán, cembalino
2 - Se je souspir (virelai)   [2:40]
Tenor (3), fidula
3 - Amours me fait desirer (ballade)   [3:14]
Mezzosoprán, rybebka, gotická harfa
4 - Ay mi! dame de valour (virelai)   [2:13]
Mezzosoprán
5 - Tant doucement – Eins que ma – [Ruina] (motet)   [1:38]
Mezzosoprán, citola, varhanní portativ (2)
6 - Mes esperis se combat (ballade)   [4:15]
Mezzosoprán, varhanní portativ (1), dousainnes
7 - Hoquetus "David"   [1:51]
Varhanní portativ (1), fidula, gotická harfa
8 - Mors sui, se je ne vous (virelai)   [2:26]
Tenor (1), dousainnes
9 - On ne porroit penser (ballade)   [2:42]
Mezzosoprán, varhanní portativ (2), fidula
10 - De triste cuer – Quant vrais – Certes (ballade)   [3:53]
Tenor (1), tenor (2), tenor (3)
11 - Honte, paour (ballade)   [4:03]
Mezzosoprán, dousainnes, fidula
12 - Hont paur (ballade)   [2:17]
(Codex I-Faenza 117)
Cembalino, gotická harfa
13 - Nes que on porroit (ballade)   [4:29]
Mezzosoprán, dousainnes, varhanní portativ (1)
14 - Ploures dames (ballade)   [4:52]
Mezzosoprán, varhanní portativ (1), fidula
15 - S'il estoit – S'Amours – [Et gaudebit] (motet)   [1:25]
Mezzosoprán, citola, fidula
16 - Dame, mon cuer emportes (virelai)   [2:54]
Tenor (1), fidula
17 - Dame, mon cuer en vous (rondelet)   [2:56]
Mezzosoprán, flétny, rybebka
18 - Gais et jolis (ballade)   [1:19]
Kontratenor, gotická harfa, citola
19 - Tant doulcement me sans (roundeau)   [3:01]
Mezzosoprán, příčná flétna, fidula, varhanní portativ (1)
20 - Plus dure que un dyamant (virelai)   [1:39]
Kontratenor, micanon
21 - De petit po (ballade)   [3:11]
Kontratenor, varhanní portativ (2), dousainnes, fidula
22 - De petit peu (ballade)   [1:03]
(Codex CS-Pu XI.E.9)
Varhanní portativ (2), fidula
23 - En amer ma douce vie (ballade)   [3:57]
Mezzosoprán, flétny, varhanní portativ (1), fidula
24 - Lasse! comment – Se j'aim mon – Pour quoy (motet)   [2:11]
Kontratenor, tenor (2), tenor (3)



25 - Franciscus ANDRIEU – Eustach DESCHAMPES: Armes, amours – O flour des flours   [4:41]
Mezzosoprán, kontratenor, dousainnes, fidula






Ars Cameralis
Lukáš Matoušek

Zuzana Matoušková • mezzosoprán
Hanuš Bartoň • varhanní portativ (1), cembalino
Milan Langer • varhanní portativ (2)
Lukáš Matoušek • flétny, dousainnes, gotická harfa, micanon
Jiří Richter • fidula, rybebka, citola



Lubomír Moravec • kontratenor, tenor (1)
Matouš Vlčinský • tenor (2)
Stanislav Předota • tenor (3)
Jana Semerádová • příčná flétna






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The French composer and poet Guillaume de Machaut is indisputably one of the most prominent figures of the 14th-century music. In his numerous poetical and musical works we can recognize an ultimately cultured, educated artist, endowed with refined sense of noble beauty. His personality is a fascinating combination of the culturally and politically influential ecclesiastical elite and a vanishing world of medieval chivalry, embodying the conquest trips across Europe, heroic deeds, but also the warm tones of the love songs intended for noble and beautiful ladies.

He was probably born in Rheims in the early 14th century. He spent his youth at the side of the "last knight of the Middle Ages" – the Bohemian King John of Luxembourg – as his personal secretary and confidential companion. In 1340 he became a canon in his native city, which ensured him permanent and quite high income. Even after the death of King John in the battle of Crécy in 1346 he remained in the courtly environment. Till the end of his days (he died 1377) he rendered his services to important European monarchs.

Machaut's exquisite taste can be recognized in his very texts. He carefully avoided lascivious allusions which were not exceptional in the period literature, rendering with great tenderness the late love he felt for the nineteen-year-old Péronne d'Armentičres in his allegorical poem with autobiographical elements Voir Dit (1361-1365). In the spirit of intellectual wit he intertwined it - same as the preceding poem Reméde de Fortune (before 1349) – with unique attempts at compositional techniques of the most important musical genres. He put some of the mentioned examples to music (Voir Dit #13, 14; Reméde #17, 19, 23). In comparison with the almost exclusively anonymous works of the Middle Ages, his efforts to assemble and classify his own works at the end of his life are quite exceptional. This activity – which must also have required considerable financial means – attests to Machaut's awareness of the quality of his compositions.

In his musical production, Machaut followed the compositional principles elaborated in the theoretical works of Phillip de Vitry, and he became one of the key artists of the late medieval style "ars nova". The decisive part of his compositions are songs for one and more voices of various forms – ballads, rondeaus, virelais and lay – the differences in their forms result from the fixed structure of the texts put to music. After hearing several compositions, characteristic features of Machaut's musical style can be recognized – for example some typical rhythmic models, frequent syncopes and characteristic sounds – which clearly distinguish him from other period composers. The typical medieval technique of isorhythm* was used above all in the numerous motets, and also when he composed the first medieval cyclical mass de Nostre Dame, which is probably the most famous of Machaut's compositions today.


* Isorhythm is a relatively complex melodically-rhythmic form of the Middle Ages. A short section of melody, most frequently an excerpt from the Gregorian chant, was linked to a rhythmic model. A "melody" thus originated, which was repeated several times, forming the basis (tenor), to which other voices were composed. In them, also the repeated rhythmic models may have been used.

Hana Vlhová




Some notes on the interpretation of Guillaume de Machaut's compositions

The musicians who have decided for a historically informed interpretation of 14th-century music, are faced with a number of problems. The first appears in the notation. By mere comparison of the famous editions (Friedrich Ludwig, 1926-9 and Leo Schrade, 1956) we can find differences in many compositions. Machaut's compositions are mostly recorded in more manuscripts. Several of them are even from Machaut's time. The editor has the possibility to compare more records where there are doubts. In the published editions, however, the compositions are usually a result combining information from more manuscripts. Owing to the fact that some compositions vary in different manuscripts (not only in details, but also in the number of voices), even where I had the facsimile of the manuscripts at my disposal, I worked with my own transcriptions. In the ballad On ne porroit penser (#9) a third voice was added (contratenor), which is noted in one source only. Also the original Machaut's three-part ballad De petit po (#21) has another (probably later) voice added - the contratenor. This ballad is recorded in two versions. The first features gradually in the separate stanzas all the combinations of voices as known from the various manuscripts. The second, two-part version from the manuscript of the Prague Národní knihovna (National Library) is written textless and will be performed instrumentally (#22). The ballad Honte, paour (#11) is complemented by its instrumental paraphrase from the late 14th century from the manuscript Faenza 117 (#12).

Another problem arises in the uses of singing voices and musical instruments. In this case we follow the period sources, particularly Machaut's own writings. In his letters (Voir Dit) Machaut asks the young Péronne d'Armentičres to learn the ballad Nes que on porroit (#13) which he composed for her. The most suitable instruments to accompany it are orgues and cornemuses or others, which is only natural for it. Besides this piece of information, the abundant use of musical instruments is evidenced in the two long lists by Machaut in the Reméde de Fortune and Prise d'Alexandrie. This is why our recording presents the voices with text in vocal execution, and the textless voices (tenor contratenor, triplum) played on instruments. Instruments are being used which were frequent in Machaut's time. To combine them, we have relied on the period written and iconographic sources.

The third problem is the question of the tempo. Even here we follow the period sources. However, those are very scarce and it is necessary to complement them by theoretical considerations. These are based on the theory of the division of note values, which had since the beginnings of the new mensural system of notation in the 14th century ("ars nova") been often discussed in numerous musical treatises. The value of the note brevis (in the modern transcriptions it takes up the length of one bar) was called tempus. From that, the division into smaller parts (prolatio) proceeded, and also the formation in higher units (modus). The two-beat or three-beat division in all these degrees provided composers with a great number of possibilities of rhythmic combinations. The sense of and feeling for the metric and rhythmic articulation, and the use of syncopes of all sorts, led Machaut and his contemporaries to exciting inventiveness. In the performance, it is only possible to achieve the distinct perception of the articulation in all three metric degrees when the tempo of the composition is determined by the pulse breves or tempus (i.e. one bar for one beat). I assume that by not supporting this play with the metre and rhythm, the performer would in fact disturb the basic meaning of the music of the High Middle Ages.

For the definition of the correct tempo of the composition, its form can be conducive. Machaut composed his songs in formes fixes (fixed forms), normally used in his period. The texts were based on the play with the refrain, and the musical form also had its precise norms. The songs of the forms of ballade, rondeau and virelai had from the 13th to the 15th centuries served as dance songs. Even though Machaut's songs are considerably stylized, their dance character is more than evident in most of them (especially in the monophonic, or simple two-voice virelais). Even Machaut's motet Lasse comment – Se j'aim – Pour quoy (#24) uses in the tenor (the basic voice, to which the other voices in the motets were added in composition) a dance song – a 13th-century virelai Por coi me bat mes maris? Even the top voices (motetus and triplum) are text-variations of the song in tenor.

To conclude I would like to say that the genius of Machaut's love songs is not merely rooted in the admirable musical procedures of melody, rhythm, harmony, and form, but also in the verses put to music, in their play with rhyme, metre, and the meaning of the word. When preparing the compositions for this recording, we could not stop admiring the originality and inventiveness of their creator.


Lukáš Matoušek



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