Chapter 2: Secular and Cathedral Music in the High Middle Ages I. Introduction A. Categorization allows us to better understand concepts in music history, but at a cost. We tend to set up binarisms, which can be problematic. With the development of notation, a certain rigidity surrounded how later generations performed the notated music (which had previously been transmitted by ear). B. Similarly, we must be careful how we distinguish sacred and secular music. Chapter 1 dealt primarily with sacred music, influenced by the fact that initially only sacred music was available for observation. Chapter 2 turns to secular music. II. Troubadours and Trouvères A.Troubadours 1. From around the eleventh century, the area of modern France known as Aquitaine enjoyed relative independence, under the powerful counts of Poitou. The affluence of this court yielded an appreciation for the arts. a. The first European vernacular poet whose work survives was William IX (7th count of Poitiers and 9th duke of Aquitaine). b. The tradition of these poets is known as the troubadour, after the Provencal word for poet. c. The troubadour tradition was a “top down,” as those of the highest social ranks were the main participants. Their poetry celebrated feudal ideals. d. Different types of troubadour verse dealt with various aspects of the feudal system, including songs of alliance, knightly decorum, exploits, challenges, and death. 2. Courtly love lay at the heart of the troubadour tradition. a. The canso was a song about love. b. Courtly love songs celebrated the same high ideals as other types of songs. c. The lady about whom a poet wrote usually outranked him, making her theoretically unattainable. d. Courtly love was generally more about veneration than physical love. e. The poetic style matches the lofty ideals of courtly love, as demonstrated in Can vei la lauzeta mover. 1) Song by Bernart de Ventadorn (d. ca. 1200), whose patron was Eleanor of Aquitaine 2) Strophic, all stanzas have same rhyme scheme 3) The imagery is high for the woman (who is high ranking) and low for the singer (who was a commoner). B. Performance and Oral Culture 1. We do not know the rhythm of troubadour songs, but most likely the loftier style of the troubadour songs approximated that of contemporary chant. 2. Some troubadour songs matched a lower-class style; these were not based on chant style. a. Pastorela is one such genre. b. L'autrier jost’ una sebissa by Marcabru is an example. c. Marcabru was at the court of William IX. 3. Joglars were low-class professional entertainers; today we would consider them minstrels. Some minstrels were able to move up the social ladder and became troubadours. 4. Troubadour songs were written down in books called chansonniers at about the time the tradition died out. 5. Some women wrote courtly songs, including the Comtessa de Dia. a. Four poems of hers survive, but only A chantar m’er de so gu’en no volria has music. b. A chantar has a structure that resembles music of a slightly later period in which there are two endings for the verses (first and second endings, called ouvert and clos in thirteenth-century manuscripts). 6. The story of Arnaut Daniel suggests that the composition of troubadour songs was an oral practice. C. Music for Elites: Trobar Clus 1. Musical debates constitute another genre of troubadour poetry: the tenso. The tenso often involved a sort of jesting between two poets, who discussed finer points of issues in feudal culture. a. A popular theme for these pieces was the virtues of highly elaborate, layered poetry whose meaning was understood only by those who knew how to “read” such poetry. This poetry is trobar clus—“closed” poetry (not open to interpretation by the general public). b. The tenso concerning the value of trobar clus (and its opposite, trobar leu) is translated on p. 52. c. Many troubadours used both types of poetry. d. The debate between “high” and “low” art continues to this day. 2. Trouvères imitated the Provençal lyrics in the thirteenth century. a. The Provençal style lasted about 200 years. The style spread in various directions in the early thirteenth century. b. The earliest imitators were the trouvères. c. Richard I (“the Lionheart”), son of Eleanor of Aquitaine, wrote poetry. Anthology I-13 is the only one of his poems that survives with music. It is in French. 3. Subtle differences mark the trouvère repertory as distinct from that of the troubadours. a. Narrative genres form more of the repertory for the trouvères. b. One of these is the lai, whose narrative stanzas reflect northern tendencies (as seen in the romances and chansons de geste). c. Chrétien de Troyes (of Arthurian legend fame) wrote such works. 4. New genres that resemble elements of folk music also were popular in thirteenth-century France. a. The chanson de toile reflected a woman’s point of view (regardless of the singer’s gender). Each stanza ended with a refrain. b. Refrains to songs circulated as stand-alone pieces. c. Trobar clus were not a primary part of the trouvère repertory. III. Formalized Song A. Adam de la Halle and the Formes Fixes 1. Arras and Paris a. In the mid-thirteenth-century, French music and literary activities shifted from the castle (e.g., Richard I) to the town. b. Musicians organized along the lines of the crafts guilds in both places. c. Arras had a Brotherhood of Minstrels and Townspeople which fostered musico-poetic interests. d. Moniot d’Arras (d. 1239), a member of this group, wrote the most famous pastourelle: Ce fut en mai. 1) This piece tells us that vieles (fiddles) could accompany dances. 2) See Ex. 2-2 for a transcription. The structure is AA1 BB1, with open and closed cadences. e. Jehan Bretel (d. 1272), also a member of the Brotherhood, was a master of the trouvère’s equivalent to the tenso, the jeu-parti. f. Bretel often “debated” Adam de la Halle (d. ca. 1307), the most famous of this group today. B. Adam de la Halle was educated at university in Paris, and his music reflects this training. 1. He is the only trouvère known to have written polyphony. Some of it is note- against-note style, but some pieces are motets (see below). 2. A chansonnier survives that includes only his works—a testament to his reputation. 3. Adam wrote a difficult type of music—polyphony—-in a relatively folksy genre, the rondel (rondeau). The name could reflect a dance that accompanied it, as well as the fact that the form includes a refrain that returns throughout: AB a A ab AB. See Ex. 2-3. 4. Another of these fixed forms (formes fixes) is the ballade, which resembles the rondeau without the refrains (capital letters in the model): aab. 5. Yet another example of a fixed form is the virelai, which repeats one of the melody of a non-repeating strain: B aab B. Because we usually begin forms with “A,” this is usually written A bba A. 6. Adam’s most famous work is a play about Robin and Marion, written while he was in Italy. It includes sixteen monophonic songs (with dancing) and duets. C. Geographical Diffusion 1. Troubadour and trouvère influence extended to several European countries. a. Cantigas were the Spanish equivalent of the canso (a courtly song in the vernacular). b. Thirteenth-century Italy saw a different type of musician in that popular (secular) melodies were fitted with religious texts for lauda spirituale. In the next century, this became known as ballata (and had the same form as the virelai). c. In Germany, the trouvère influence can be seen in the songs of the Minnesingers. “Minne” translates to “courtly love,” and “singer” is the same. They sang lieder, the German word for songs, and courtly love songs were therefore Minnelieder. The most famous of these was Walther von der Vogelweide (d. ca. 1230). 1) Minnesingers sang in three main genres: Leich (similar to the lai); Lied (related to the canso or chanson courtoise); and Spruch (literally “saying,” a debate- type genre). 2) Minnelieder as an art gradually became part of a folk tradition. This move can be first seen in the works of Neidhardt von Reuenthal (d. ca. 1250), whose pieces became part of an oral tradition, collected as folk songs by the German Romantics. 3) Wagner’s opera Der Meistersinger von Nürnberg highlights the songs of later generations (fourteenth–seventeenth), whose masterpieces (Meisterstück) were crafted songs. These were in bar form: AAB. Hans Sachs, a real person, is the leader of Wagner’s Meistersingers. D. A Note on Instruments 1. Illustrations in manuscripts such as those that contain cantigas include detailed pictures of music making at court. They are so precise that scholars believe some may depict actual people. On the other hand, as a work of art, they may also be a way of showing what instruments existed, and do not necessarily mean these instruments played together. a. Because most Medieval songs are monophonic does not mean that instruments were not used to accompany them. b. Evidence suggests that certain instruments were used to accompany specific types of pieces, depending on genre and social connotations. The more lofty the genre, the more likely it was performed by solo voice (alone). 2. With the lowering of social standing of trouvère song, more instruments came to be used in performances. a. Moniot d’Arras’s Ce fut en mai specifically describes a fiddler playing for dancing. 3. The most elaborate dance form was the estampie, which resembled the lai or sequence with its pairs of strains (and open and closed cadences).