1350s. Formally, the motets use isorhythmic designs based on chant tenors and are
evenly divided among bipartite designs with diminution and unipartite designs. Three
motets are based on secular tenors in virelai or rondeau form, one of which, Lasse
comment oublieray/Se j’aim mon loyal/ Pour quoy me bat mes maris, sets a 13th-century
dance song, the complaint of a malmariée.
Machaut is unique among 14th-century composers in his cultivation of the difficult lai
with music. Although most of the musical lais are monophonic, their great length,
demanding a half-hour or more in performance, requires an attention to formal balance
and development unprecedented in medieval music.
The composition of polyphonic songs based on the formes fixes of ballade, rondeau,
and virelai, began probably in the 1340s. Several experimental early works give the
impression that Machaut was decisive in the development of this new musical style. The
mature works, with a highly melismatic text carrying voice accompanied by textless tenor
and contratenor, remained standard through most of the 15th century. A small core of
works, mostly ballades, circulated widely, reaching Languedoc, Italy, and the empire,
especially the popular De petit po, De Fortune me doy plaindre, and De toutes fleurs. The
learned enumeration of mythological characters in the Voir dit double ballade Quant
Theseus/Ne quier veoir and the clear musical setting-off of the refrain are characteristics
imitated in later 14th-century ballades.
Machaut’s Mass, formerly thought to have been composed for the coronation of
Charles V at Reims on May 19, 1364, is now considered to have been composed for a
foundation made by Guillaume and his brother Jean for services to commemorate their
deaths. The Mass appears to have been performed regularly at these services at the
cathedral of Reims until after 1411.
Machaut stands at the culmination of a movement in French literature marked by a
growing interest in the manuscript presentation of an author’s works. Several
manuscripts, prepared at various stages of Machaut’s career, collect his complete works,
carefully organized into sections by genre, most usually retaining the same order from
manuscript to manuscript, with new works added at the end of each series. In general, it
appears that each genre is arranged in chronological order. Such complete-works
manuscripts had an influence on later poets, such as Froissart and Christine de Pizan; the
transmission of musical works after Machaut, however, was confined largely to mixed
anthologies.
The Machaut manuscripts are often elaborately illuminated, and the series of
illustrations for a given narrative poem was in many cases doubtless determined by the
author. The several artists who illustrated Machaut’s manuscripts include figures known
for their work on manuscripts of kings John II and Charles V. Unfortunately, the original
owners of these volumes, except for a posthumous collection belonging to the duke of
Berry, have not been conclusively identified.
William W.Kibler/Lawrence Earp
[See also: ANAGRAM; BALLADE; DIT; FORMES FIXES; ISORHYTHMIC
MOTET; LAI-DESCORT; MARGIVAL, NICOLE DE; RONDEAU; VERSIFICATION;
VIRELAI]
Machaut, Guillaume de. Œuvres de Guillaume de Machaut, ed. Ernest Hoepffner. 3 vols. Paris:
Didot, 1908–21.
——. Guillaume de Machaut: poésies lyriques, ed. Vladimir Chichmaref. 2 vols. Paris: Champion,
1909.
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