Guillaume de Machaut - A Lover's Death (The Orlando Consort)

Information

Composer: Guillaume de Machaut

1. Hareu! hareu! le feu / Helas! ou sera pris confors / Obediens usque ad mortem, Motet 10
2. Mors sui, se je ne vous voy, Virelai 26
3. Je ne cuit pas, Ballada 14
4. Quand je ne voy, Rondeau 21
5. Diex, Biauté, Douceur, Nature, Virelai 19
6. Biauté qui toutes autres pere, Ballade 4
7. Quant vraie amour enflamee / O series summe rata / Super omnes speciosa, Motet 17
8. De petit po, Ballada 18
9. Dous viaire gracieus, Rondeau 1
10. Douce dame jolie, Virelai 4
11. Amours me fait desirer, Ballade 19
12. Ce qui soustient moy, Rondeau 12
13. Amours qui ha le pouoir / Faus Samblant m'a deceu / Vidi Dominum, Motet 12
14. N'en fait n'en dit, Ballade 11
15. Ma chiere dame, Ballade 40
16. Liement me deport, Virelai 27
17. Martyrum gemma latria / iligenter inquiramus / A Christo honoratus, Motet 19

The Orlando Consort

    Matthew Venner, countertenor

    Mark Dobell, tenor

    Angus Smith, tenor

    Donald Greig, baritone

Date: 2025

Label: Hyperion

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Although we generally know little about medieval artists, the poet-composer Guillaume de Machaut (c1300–1377) constitutes a happy exception. We possess more of his works than of any other composer before 1500. Machaut’s self-consciousness as an artist compelled him to collect his compositions, both literary and musical, in a work-book ‘that contains all the things I have made’ and from which he had beautiful manu - scripts copied for his wealthy patrons. A fair number of these codices have been preserved, among which six contain his music. Without these manuscripts we would have knowledge of only a small number of apparently popular works by Machaut, as copied in other song collections.

This recording features four motets that capture the range of Machaut’s art in this genre. Motets probably belong to his first polyphonic compositions; all four recorded here date from before 1350. In Machaut’s time the motet had developed into a learned genre, calling both for knowledge of music theory and practice, and for literary erudition. Motets are usually built on a fragment from Gregorian chant that is rhythmicized in the taleae, slow repeated rhythmic patterns in the tenor. The upper voices, called triplum and motetus, move more quickly, in phrases that correspond with these taleae. Their melodies harmonize with the tenor notes but can also create contrasts, especially in the middle voice (the motetus). The words of the chant fragment bear a relationship to the subjects explored in the texts of the upper voices, and part of the game is to discover how that relationship functions. Brief as motets are in performance, to fully understand them demands deep study. These works were destined for connoisseurs who themselves wrote motets and exchanged ideas. In two motets by other composers, Machaut is mentioned in the company of twelve such learned men, among whom we find Philippe de Vitry (1291–1361), the other great composer from the fourteenth century. Several of Machaut’s works show traces of influence from music by Vitry.