Guillaume de Machaut (sometimes spelled Machault) (c. 1300 – April 1377) was a Medieval French poet and composer. He is one of the earliest composers on whom significant biographical information is available.
Machaut was "the last great poet who was also a composer", in the words of the scholar Daniel Leech-Wilkinson. Well into the 15th century, Machaut's poetry was greatly admired and imitated by other poets, including Geoffrey Chaucer.
Machaut composed in a wide range of styles and forms. He is a part of the musical movement known as the ars nova.
Machaut helped develop the motet and secular song forms (particularly the lai and the formes fixes: rondeau, virelai and ballade). Machaut wrote the Messe de Nostre Dame, the earliest known complete setting of the Ordinary of the Mass attributable to a single composer.
Machaut was born c. 1300 and educated in the region around Rheims. Though his surname most likely derives from the nearby town of Machault, 30 km to the east of Rheims in the Ardennes region, most scholars believe his birthplace was in fact Rheims. He was employed as secretary to John I, Count of Luxemburg and King of Bohemia, from 1323 to 1346; in addition he became a Canon(1337). Most likely he accompanied King John on his various trips, many of them military expeditions, around Europe (including Prague). He was named as the canon of Verdun in 1330, Arras in 1332 and Rheims in 1337. By 1340 Machaut was living in Rheims, having relinquished his other canonic posts at the request of Pope Benedict XII. In 1346, King John was killed fighting at the Battle of Crécy, and Machaut, who was famous and much in demand, entered the service of various other aristocrats and rulers including King John's daughter Bonne (who died of the Black Death in 1349), her sons Jean de Berry and Charles (later Charles V), Duke of Normandy, and others such as Charles II of Navarre.
Machaut survived the Black Death which devastated Europe, and spent his later years living in Rheims composing and supervising the creation of his complete-works manuscripts. His poem Le voir dit (probably 1361-1365) purports to recount a late love affair with a 19-year-old girl, Péronne d'Armentières, although the accuracy of the work as autobiography is contested.[citation needed] When he died in 1377, other composers such as François Andrieu wrote elegies lamenting his death.
Guillaume de Machault
Biography
Guillaume de Machaut (sometimes spelled Machault) (c. 1300 – April 1377) was a Medieval French poet and composer. He is one of the earliest composers on whom significant biographical information is available.Machaut was "the last great poet who was also a composer", in the words of the scholar Daniel Leech-Wilkinson. Well into the 15th century, Machaut's poetry was greatly admired and imitated by other poets, including Geoffrey Chaucer.
Machaut composed in a wide range of styles and forms. He is a part of the musical movement known as the ars nova.
Machaut helped develop the motet and secular song forms (particularly the lai and the formes fixes: rondeau, virelai and ballade). Machaut wrote the Messe de Nostre Dame, the earliest known complete setting of the Ordinary of the Mass attributable to a single composer.
Machaut was born c. 1300 and educated in the region around Rheims. Though his surname most likely derives from the nearby town of Machault, 30 km to the east of Rheims in the Ardennes region, most scholars believe his birthplace was in fact Rheims. He was employed as secretary to John I, Count of Luxemburg and King of Bohemia, from 1323 to 1346; in addition he became a Canon(1337). Most likely he accompanied King John on his various trips, many of them military expeditions, around Europe (including Prague). He was named as the canon of Verdun in 1330, Arras in 1332 and Rheims in 1337. By 1340 Machaut was living in Rheims, having relinquished his other canonic posts at the request of Pope Benedict XII. In 1346, King John was killed fighting at the Battle of Crécy, and Machaut, who was famous and much in demand, entered the service of various other aristocrats and rulers including King John's daughter Bonne (who died of the Black Death in 1349), her sons Jean de Berry and Charles (later Charles V), Duke of Normandy, and others such as Charles II of Navarre.
Machaut survived the Black Death which devastated Europe, and spent his later years living in Rheims composing and supervising the creation of his complete-works manuscripts. His poem Le voir dit (probably 1361-1365) purports to recount a late love affair with a 19-year-old girl, Péronne d'Armentières, although the accuracy of the work as autobiography is contested.[citation needed] When he died in 1377, other composers such as François Andrieu wrote elegies lamenting his death.