14th-Century Music: Machaut, Trecento, and Sacred Song Reviewed

Fourteenth-century music

When Machaut declared that every instrument—whether woodwind, string, or keyboard—owes its existence to Music, he spoke from intimate knowledge of the sounds around him. It is tempting to imagine medieval music as split between just two stark categories: the unaccompanied liturgical chant of churches and monasteries, and the earthy instrumental music of taverns and feasts. The recordings discussed here reveal far greater subtlety in both sacred and secular traditions, with the most compelling performances blending voices and instruments with imagination and care.

Three of the discs focus exclusively on Guillaume de Machaut. His towering presence in fourteenth-century music history comes from both the quantity and the quality of his output. No other poet of his era made musical expression so essential to his art, and the refinement of his verbal and musical language offers performers rich opportunities to articulate intricate word-music combinations. The Orlando Consort delivers its trademark finesse on two recordings: Guillaume Machaut: Songs from Le Voir Dit (Hyperion CDA67727, recorded 2012, 64′) and Guillaume Machaut: Dart of Love (Hyperion CDA68008, recorded 2013, 65′), the latter presenting monophonic and polyphonic courtly love songs. Listeners familiar with the group’s earlier track ‘Ne que on pourroit’ on Food, wine & song: Music and feasting in renaissance Europe (Harmonia Mundi HMU907314, recorded 2001, 73′) will recognise their characteristic texture: one vocalist sings the poetry against an untexted vocal backdrop. This approach lets the text emerge clearly from the polyphonic fabric, whether through Matthew Venner’s countertenor in ‘Ne que on pourroit’ and ‘Plouré dames’ or through a tenor in ‘Dame, se vous n’avez aperceü’. On The Dart of Love, the Orlandos show their command of a wide stylistic range—intricate motets and rondeaux, expressive ballades and virelais. A chace tentatively credited to Denis le Grant (d. 1352) offers entertaining, virtuosic depictions of animals and hunting calls, the protagonist lamenting that he now sings less because of his outdoor chivalric pursuits—an ironic poetic move also found in Machaut’s lengthy ballade Pour ce que tous. Both Orlando Consort discs use scores prepared by Yolanda Plumley and others as part of The Complete Works of Guillaume de Machaut, a project that will surely inspire further performances of this calibre.

Yet the Machaut disc that made the strongest impression was Guillaume Machaut: Mon chant vous envoy: Virelais, ballades et rondeaux (Eloquentia EL 1342, recorded 2012, 61′), which pairs voices and instruments in carefully chosen combinations. The recording as a whole is striking for its beauty and control, but certain tracks stand out: ‘Dou mal qui m’a longuement’, where Marc Mauillon’s gentle voice is supported by delicately plucked strings, and the well-known rondeau ‘Dix et sept’, which cleverly encodes the lady’s name in numbers. Comparing this to The Orlando Consort’s slower version on Le Voir Dit shows how tempo choices can shift emphasis from the poetic game toward the numerical puzzle.

Codex Chantilly II (Et’cetera KTC 1905, 2011, 77′) glistens in its exploration of music by Machaut, Solage, Grimace and others. Although the balance can feel top-heavy at times, each intricate line is performed with control and sensitivity to rhythmic and melodic subtleties. The opening piece, ‘Toute clarté’, describes a world turned upside-down—a fitting start for a collection displaying some of the period’s most contrapuntally complex music in the ars subtilior style.

Travel and pilgrimage allowed very different cultural and musical traditions to interact. La Camera delle Lacrime offers a highly dramatic account of Le livre vermeil de Montserrat (Paraty 414125, recorded 2013, 61′), also known as the Llibre Vermell, benefiting from imaginative staging and scenography by Khaï-dong Luong. Recorded in concert, it retains a live presence even if some edges are rough. The Dordogne Youth Choir is especially delightful, their voices brimming with the enthusiasm of young musicians discovering medieval song. The choir captures both the reverence of ‘Polorum regina’ and the joy of ‘Stella splendens’, contrasting effectively with the solo voices and instruments. Bruno Bonhoure’s dramatic vocal style sometimes pushes pulse and ensemble a little, but the instrumentalists and choir keep control in what clearly made for an entertaining live show.

Il Codice di S. Maria Maggiore, sec. XIV (Tactus TC 400005, recorded 2013, 63′) reveals the Abruzzo region of Italy as a cultural crossroads. On the east side of central modern Italy, the area was well placed for its musicians to absorb ideas from travellers, developing a distinctive local repertoire. Directed by Marco Giacintucci, the ensemble presents the collection’s religious music both vocally and as inspiration for instrumental dances, including saltarelli based on two- and three-part Sanctus settings. Although the liner notes are not entirely clear, the recording appears to have been made live in a resonant architectural space over a few takes. This may explain its coherent phrasing and the way it captures something of the multisensory concert experience, where listeners could see musicians playing replica instruments drawn from medieval iconography.

The musical practices of nuns are explored in Exit Rosa: Canti per le monache dal manoscritto Q.11 di Bologna (Tactus TC 280002, 2011, 54′), a mix of plainchant and polyphony, some with instrumental accompaniment, that also includes spoken prayer from manuscript annotations. This codex, a miscellany owned by Sister Guiduça, was copied in Italy around 1300. Its varied contents reflect interests the nuns shared with the broader liturgical repertory circulating in Europe at the time. Ensemble Korymbos sings with great lyricism, though the pitch occasionally feels high. Director Alessandra Fiori also includes items from the Las Huelgas Codex, a comparable anthology used by nuns at the wealthy Cistercian convent of Santa Maria la Real de Las Huelgas in Burgos, northern Spain. For instance, the group sings Claustrum pudicitie / Virgo viget / Flos filius eius, a piece that also appears as Castrum pudicitie in the Bamberg Codex and—with French-texted upper parts—in the Montpellier Codex. This well-travelled motet, full of references to French secular song, reminds us of the cultural literacy of religious women. Exit Rosa deserves a place alongside other fine releases dedicated to nuns’ song collections, such as Ensemble Organum’s recording of the Gradual of Eleanor of Brittany (Harmonia Mundi HMU901403, recorded 1991, 61′), with which it shares some repertory.

Hör, Kristenhait! – Sacred Songs by the Last of the Minnesingers (Christophorus CHR 77395, recorded 2015, 79′) presents music by Oswald von Wolkenstein (c. 1376–1445) and the musician known only as the Monk of Salzburg. Bagpipes and other instruments enrich the texture, and the performances benefit from strong improvisatory skill, as in a version of the Christmas hymn A solis ortus cardine set to German words (Von anegeng der sunne kchlar) by the Monk of Salzburg. The title track, arranged for lute and voice, stresses the importance of a chaste life—a personal challenge for Oswald, whose documented travels, political engagement, and romantic liaisons seem at odds with his final burial at Neustift monastery. This disc adjusts our understanding of Oswald’s music by presenting sacred song rather than the courtly texts with which he is more often associated.

Rosa e Orticha: Music of the Trecento (Carpe Diem CD-16287, 2011, 60′) demonstrates a sensitive understanding of how to sequence short pieces, here tracing a day from dawn to dusk. Starting with evocative woodwind sounds, Ensemble Syntagma uses expressive improvisation to convey the heart of each work. The musicians use their instruments to paint a world where they imagine ‘material reality and the invisible freely flew together’. The results are exploratory, tasteful, and evocative, particularly highlighting the sophisticated songs of Bartolino da Padova alongside those of his contemporaries. The ensemble playing is tightly focused, blending the voices of Mami Irisawa, Catherine Jousselin, and Akira Tachikawa with the natural contours of the instrumental lines.