Short takes, August 2021

Short takes, August 2021

This Week in Classical Music: August 2, 2021.  Short takes.  We’ll follow the lead of the musicologist Alejandro Planchart who, after sorting out all kind of information, had determined Guillaume Dufay and Gilles Binchoisthat Guillaume Dufay was born on August 5th of 1397.  Dufay (his name was also spelled as Du Fay and Du Fayt) was the most famous composer of his time, that being the early Renaissance of European music.  (The picture to the left indirectly attests to his fame: depicted on the left is Guillaume Dufay, on the right – Gilles Binchois, three years younger but also a famous composer; the script above the figures calls Dufay, and only him, “maître,” or master– Binchois is identified just by his name).  We’ve written about Dufay a number of times, the last time just a year ago when we analyzed his peregrinations around Europe, here, which are absolutely fascinating, considering the distances he traveled and the general lack of any transportation infrastructure.  Getting back to music: what we also find interesting is the use of certain technical devices, which changed as music forms were being developed.  For example, early in his career, Dufay wrote what is called “isorhythmic” music.  Isorhythm is just a way of using a fixed rhythmic pattern, called talea, which repeats, without change, in one of the voices, usually in the tenor.  The use of talea was invented in the Middle Ages, was used by composers like Guillaume de Machaut, and was supposed to give certain structure to the musical piece.  That’s how Dufay wrote his motets and masses early on.  He dropped this device to write freer and more melodic music later in his career.  Here’s Dufay’s early isorhythmic motet, Vasilissa ergo gaude (Therefore rejoice, princess) from about 1420.  It’s performed by the Huelgas Ensemble, Paul Van Nevel conducting.  And here’s the section Gloria in excelsis Deo from Dufay’s mass Missa ave regina, which was written later in his life, after 1463 (Dufay died in 1474).  Ensemble Cantus Figuratus is led by Dominique Vellard.

Several composers from the modern era were also born this week: the Frenchman André Jolivet on August 8th of 1905 in Montmartre, Paris, and the American, William Schuman, on August 4th of 1910, in Manhattan, New York.  Another French composer, Cécile Chaminade, was born on August 8th of 1857, also in Paris.  With recent changes in cultural attitudes, Chaminade has enjoyed more popularity than any time since her death in 1944.  We’ll have a guest post about Chaminade coming soon.  Also, Erich Kleiber, the great Austrian conductor, was born on August 5th of 1890, in Vienna.  He moved to Berlin in 1923 to assume the directorship of the Berlin State Opera.  Kleiber, who was neither Jewish nor politically active and therefore could have continued to live and conduct safely in Germany, left the country in protest to the Nazi regime’s policies and emigrated to Argentina.  Erich Kleiber was the father of Carlos Kleiber, also a celebrated conductor.