Transcript The Ars Nova

The Ars Nova
Musical Developments in the
Fourteenth Century
• Ars novae musicae The Art of New Music)
– Jehan des Murs (ca. 1290 – ca. 1350)
• Ars nova (The New Art)
– Philippe de Vitry (1291–1361)
Music from Mathematics
• Perfection/ Imperfection
• Modus, Tempus, Prolation
– Tempus perfectum, prolatio major
– Tempus perfectum, prolatio minor
– Tempus imperfectum, prolatio major
– Tempus imperfectum, prolatio minor
The Roman de Fauvel
• Gervais du Bus
• Tribum/Quoniam/MERITO
[Anthology 1-24]
– Philippe de Vitry
– Isorhythmic motet
Isorhythm
• Talea (repeating rhythmic values)
• Color (recurring melodic pattern)
Guillaume de Machaut
(ca. 1300–1377)
• “Last of the trouvères”
• “Greatest French poet of his age”
Guillaume de Machaut
• Felix virgo/Inviolata/ADTE SUSPIRAMUS
[Anthology 1-25]
– Isorhythmic motet
– Musica ficta
• causa necessitatis (harmonically necessary
adjustments)
• causa pulchritudinis (chromatic adjustments made “for
the sake of their beauty”)
Guillaume de Machaut
• Chanson
– “top-down style”
• Douce dame jolie [Anthology 1-26a]
– Monophonic virelai
Guillaume de Machaut
• En mon cuer [Anthology 1-26b]
– Polyphonic virelai
– Texted cantus
– Cantilena style
Guillaume de Machaut
• Tres bonne et belle [Anthology 1-26c]
– virelai
• Rose, liz [Anthology 1-27]
– rondeau
Guillaume de Machaut
• La Messe de Nostre Dame [Anthology 1-28]
• Polyphonic setting of the mass ordinary
– Cyclic mass ordinary
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Kyrie
Gloria
Credo
Sanctus
Agnus Dei
Canons
• Literati
• “connoisseur's art”
• Machuat, Ma fin est mon conmencement (My
end is my beginning, and my beginning my
end)
• Latin rota (“round”)
• French chace; Italian caccia (“chase”)
Subtilitas
• Ars subtilior
• Treatise by Philippus Caserta
– “Subtiliorem modum” – composing with greater
subtlety
– En remirant [Anthology 1-29]
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Ballade
Lengthy passages of syncopation
Interplay of perfect and imperfect values
Superimposed and juxtaposed time signatures
Unusual note shapes
Subtilitas
• Chantilly Codex
– Solage, Fumeux fume (Smoky Smoke)
[Anthology 1-30]
• Rondeau
Trecento Vernacular Music
• Italian “1300s”
• Madrigale
– Vernacular poem
– Two or more three-line stanzas and a ritornello
• Pomerium, Marchetto of Padua (1319)
– Treatise on theory and notation
• Squarcialupi Codex (ca. 1415)
– Compendium of Trecento compositions
Trecento Vernacular Music
• Jacopo da Bologna (1340 – ca. 1386)
– Osellecto salvagio
• Madrigal [Anthology 1-31a]
• Caccia [Anthology 1-31b]
Ballata
• AbbaA (similar to French virelai)
• Francesco Landini (ca. 1325–1397)
– Non avrà ma’ pietà [Anthology 1-32]
• “Landini cadence”
• Intabluation of Faenza Codex
The Motet as Political Show
• Convergence of French and Italian styles
• Northern European musicians employed in
Italian courts
The Motet as Political Show
• Johannes Ciconia (ca. 1370–1412)
– Born in Liège, employed in Padua
– Doctorum principem super ethera/Melodia su
avissima cantemus [Anthology 1-33]
The Motet as Political Show
• Guillaume Du Fay (ca. 1397–1474)
– Born near Brussels, employed in various Italian
courts and Pope Eugene IV
– Nuper rosarum flores [Anthology 1-34]
• Florence cathedral dedicated to the Virgin Mary
• Symbolic durational proportions 6:4:2:3