The Music of France

Week 2: The Coming of Polyphony

Organum, Notre Dame SchoolConductus and MotetGuillaume de Machaut

César FranckCamille Saint-SaënsAlfred Cortot

We’ll never know precisely how it all happened, because the historical record is just too fragmentary.

But it seems that monks started singing chant in a new way, probably around the time of Charlemagne.

This reciting tone, preserved in the Abbey of St. Martial in Limoges, documents the new style.

It starts simply enough—just a priest leading a chorus in simple responsorial style.

And that’s the beginning of

Polyphony!

Parallel Organum

❖ Earliest notated forms of polyphony

❖ Organum was the term used from the 9th century onwards to describe polyphonic liturgical works.

❖ Organum can refer to the singing voice—the vocal organ, and doesn’t therefore imply a musical instrument.

❖ Gregorian chant with an added voice at the octave, fifth, and/or fourth

Parallel Organum

❖ 1: Chant line alone (monophony)

❖ 2: Chant doubled at the octave (very early)

❖ 3: Chant doubled at the upper and lower fifth

Florid (Melismatic) Organum

❖ Probably somewhat later style than parallel

❖ Melisma: passages with many notes set to a single syllable of text. Plural melismata; adjective melismatic.

❖ The strict note-against-note disappears

❖ How the two voices fit together is a matter of modern interpretation: the notation isn’t clear

Florid Organum

❖ O primus homo coruit

❖ From St. Martial, in Limoges (part of Aquitaine)

❖ Two voices, both in a relatively free style

Notre Dame School❖ A great singing school was founded at Notre Dame in

the 12th century.

❖ Out of this comes the “Notre Dame School”, which refers specifically to three composers who were active at Notre Dame

❖ Magister Albert

❖ Magister Leoninus (Leonin) (mid-12th c.)

❖ Magister Perotinus (Perotin) (early 13th c.)

Notre Dame School

❖ Leonin: Propter veritatem

❖ From the collection called the Magnus Liber Organi (Great Book of Organa)

❖ Melismatic organum in two parts

❖ Original plainchant is slowed down dramatically

❖ Upper line is a freer melisma on a vowel

Notre Dame School❖ Perotin: Alleluia. Diffusa est gratia❖ Structure:

❖ Chant: Alleluia❖ Organum: Diffusa est gratia in labiis tuis; (propterea

benedixit te) deus(Grace has been poured out upon your lips; therefore, God (has blessed you) eternally.)

❖ Chant: in aeternam❖ Chant: Alleluia

A technique called conductus emerged, in which all the voices sang in precisely the same rhythmic pattern.

Originally, conducti were used to end phrases in one of those long melismatic organa of the Notre Dame School.

But eventually they took off on their own.

Anonymous

Ave virgo virginum 3-Part Conductus

Ensemble Organum

The problem with conductus is easy enough to hear: because everybody sings a rhythmic pattern based on the words, and everybody sings the same words:

It gets really blah.

The solution?

Give the voices different texts—that way their rhythmic patterns can be different, and they won’t end their phrases all at precisely the same time.

Thus is born the motet, one of the most successful musical genres of all time.

Motets were popular from the 13th century onward, and could be dressed up or down—sophisticated or earthy, as the case may be.

Most motets have a plainchant as their “held” (tenor) line.

The voices above the tenor—duplum and triplum—will have their own individual texts.

Sometimes the upper texts will be in the vernacular (such as French) while the tenor is in Latin.

Anonymous

Amours mi font souffrir/En mai/Flos filius 3-Part Motet

Anonymous 4

First, we’ll hear Amours mi font with the tenor plainchant Flos filius accentuated with added harp and a “bouncing ball.”

Next, we’ll hear Amours mi font with the duplum In mai accentuated with added harp.

Then, with the triuplum Amours mi font accentuated with added harp.

The Ars Nova

❖ The 14th century in France

❖ Called the “Trecento” in Italy

❖ Extremely troubled era❖ 100 years war

❖ Papal Schism

❖ First major outbreak of the plague

Father abandoned child, wife husband, one brother another; for this illness seemed to strike through the breath and sight. And so they died. And none could be found to bury the dead for money or friendship. Members of a household brought their dead to a ditch as best they could, without priest, without divine offices ... great pits were dug and piled deep with the multitude of dead. And they died by the hundreds both day and night ... And as soon as those ditches were filled more were dug ... And I … buried my five children with my own hands. And there were also those who were so sparsely covered with earth that the dogs dragged them forth and devoured many bodies throughout the city. There was no one who wept for any death, for all awaited death. And so many died that all believed it was the end of the world. This situation continued [from May] until September.

—Agnolo di Tura, ca. 1348

Detailed study of the mortality data available points to two conspicuous features in relation to the mortality caused by the Black Death: namely the extreme level of mortality caused by the Black Death, and the remarkable similarity or consistency of the level of mortality, from Spain in southern Europe to England in north-western Europe. The data is sufficiently widespread and numerous to make it likely that the Black Death swept away around 60 per cent of Europe’s population. It is generally assumed that the size of Europe’s population at the time was around 80 million. This implies that around 50 million people died in the Black Death.

—Ole Benedictow

Guillaume de Machaut

❖ Leading figure of Ars Nova

❖ c. 1300 - 1377

❖ Contemporary with Geoffrey Chaucer

The Chanson

❖ A “song” (chanson) is a secular polyphonic composition

❖ A chanson can be simple or elaborate

❖ Machaut’s chansons were generally meant for a sophisticated audience, so they tend to be extremely elaborate.

Dame, de qui toute ma joie vient

❖ Machaut chanson

❖ Each line is treated with long melismas and elaborate underlying non-imitative polyphony

❖ The form is simple: a a’ b — typical of most secular music of this period.

Guillaume de Machaut

Dame, de qui toute ma joie vient

Liber unUsualis

Modern French Polyphony

In the late 19th century, a number of French composers began incorporating learned polyphonic structures into their compositions, although earlier in the century polyphony had been relatively rare.

Polyphony was less common in Austria and Germany during this era, although Brahms certainly had a polyphonic itch.

The French composers with a strong polyphonic bent tended to be those who were also church organists, which made sense:

Church organists spend a lot of time around Bach and Palestrina, both composers who wrote highly polyphonic music.

César Franck

Prélude, Choral et Fugue Arthur Rubinstein, pianoRecorded 1952

About César Franck

❖ 1822–1890

❖ Although he was of Belgian birth, he is generally considered a French composer given his training and his lifetime career in France.

❖ He worked as an organist, composer, pianist, and teacher. In that latter capacity, he was Vincent D’Indy’s teacher, among others.

❖ His compositional output was small but meticulously constructed, often making use of ‘cyclic’ themes that run through an entire composition.

Prélude, Choral et Fugue

❖ From 1884

❖ An advanced and complex work, the Prélude, Choral et Fugue ends with a massive four-voice fugue.

❖ (Fugue: systematic treatment of a single melodic idea by a fixed number of melodic lines, or voices, usually 4.)

❖ During the fugue, Franck refers back to both the Prélude and the Choral.

Camille Saint-Saëns

Fugue in C Major, Op. 161 No. 6

Geoffrey Burleson, piano

About Camille Saint-Saëns

❖ 1835–1921

❖ Mozart-level child prodigy

❖ Superb pianist

❖ Prolific composer

❖ Especially in later years was criticized for valuing technique over inspiration

About the Fugue Op. 161, No. 6

❖ “Double” fugue with two subjects (the 2nd one appears at the mid-point)

❖ Makes use of inversion during the episodes

❖ Makes use of “stretto” — i.e., overlapping subject entries

❖ Makes use of “diminution” — i.e., speeding up the fugue subject

Alfred Cortot

1877–1962

Alfred Cortot was an esteemed pianist, conductor, and teacher whose posthumous reputation is marred by his decision to support the French Vichy government during WWII and to retain his close connections with supporters of the Third Reich. The French government convicted him of collaboration with the enemy after the war; he was banned from public performances for a year. His career recovered, but he never regained the trust of many of his colleagues.

His teaching is legendary and he trained several generations of superb pianists, either in whole or in part.

He formed a piano trio with cellist Pau Casals and violinist Jacques Thibaut. Their recordings of several important works—esp. the first Schubert piano trio—remain among the golden jewels of gramophone history.

As a pianist, he was technically immaculate in his earlier years. A rigorous concert and teaching schedule left him without much practice time, with the result that in both concert and in recordings he is sometimes a bit sloppy.

Whether or not his fingers were up to the task, his mind always was. He was truly one of history’s most insightful musicians, with a magnificent feeling for the long line and an almost uncanny ability to bring music to vivid life.

His playing had deteriorated terribly after the War and thus he is best served by his earlier recordings. Fortunately he was as prolific in the recording studio as he was in public, so we can hear this magisterial pianist at all stages of his long career.

Alfred Cortot

Frederic Chopin: Etude in Ab Major, Op. 25 No. 1 “Harp”

Recorded 1934

Alfred Cortot

Frederic Chopin: Nocturne in E-flat Major, Op. 9 No. 2

Recorded 1933