Music 1101 to 1301 AD

Troubadour

1100

Troubadour was a composer and performer of Old Occitan lyric poetry during the High Middle Ages. Under the influence of the troubadours, related movements sprang up throughout Europe: the Minnesang in Germany, trovadorismo in Galicia and Portugal, and that of the trouvères in northern France.The texts of troubadour songs deal mainly with themes of chivalry and courtly love. Most were metaphysical, intellectual, and formulaic. Many were humorous or vulgar satires.

Music

Period: 1101 to 1301

William IX, Duke of Aquitaine

1102

William's greatest legacy to history was not as a warrior but as a troubadour. He was the earliest troubadour whose work survives. Eleven of his songs survive (Merwin, 2002). The song traditionally numbered as the eighth (Farai chansoneta nueva) is of dubious attribution, since its style and language are significantly different . Song 5 has two significantly different versions in different manuscripts. The songs are attributed to him under his title as Count of Poitou ).

Bernart de Ventadorn

1135

Now thought of as "the Master Singer" he developed the cançons into a more formalized style which allowed for sudden turns.He is remembered for his mastery as well as popularisation of the trobar leu style, and for his prolific cançons, which helped define the genre and establish the "classical" form of courtly love poetry, to be imitated and reproduced throughout the remaining century and a half of troubadour activity.

Creation of conductus

1150

type of sacred, but non-liturgical vocal composition for one or more voices. The word derives from Latin conducere (to escort), and the conductus was most likely sung while the lectionary was carried from its place of safekeeping to the place from which it was to be read. The conductus was one of the principal types of vocal composition of the ars antiqua period of medieval music history.

Birth of Leonin

1150

was the first known significant composer of polyphonic organum.According to W.G. Waite, writing in 1954: "It was Léonin's incomparable achievement to introduce a rational system of rhythm into polyphonic music for the first time, and, equally important, to create a method of notation expressive of this rhythm."

Creation of clausula

1160

In late medieval Western music, a clausula was a newly composed polyphonic section for two or more voices sung in discant style ("note against note") over a cantus firmus. Clausulae eventually became used as substitutes for passages of original plainchant. They occur as melismatic figures based on a single word or syllable within an organum. The text of a clausula differs from that of the plainchant melody underneath it.

Trouvère

1160

The etymology of the word troubadour and its cognates in other languages is disputed, but may be related to trobar "to compose, to discuss, to invent", cognative with Old French trover "to compose something in verses". a Parisian musical theorist of the early 14th century, believed that trouvère songs inspired kings and noblemen to do great things and to be great

Comtessa de Dia

1175

Her song A chantar m'er de so qu'eu no volria in the Occitan language is the only canso by a trobairitz to survive with its music intact.

Gautier de Coincy

1177

Gautier de Coincy was a French abbot, poet and musical arranger, chiefly known for his devotion to the Virgin Mary. While he served as prior of Vic-sur-Aisne he compiled Les Miracles de Nostre-Dame in which he set poems in praise of the Virgin Mary to popular melodies and songs of his day. It is a reverential but humorous work, full of love for the cult of the Virgin Mary,

Arnaut Daniel

1180

Daniel's attempt to avoid simple and commonplace expressions in favour of striving for newer and more subtle effects found an admirer in Dante who would imitate the sestina's form in more than one song.[9] Petrarch also wrote several sestinas as the form later gained popularity with Italian poets.

Neidhart von Reuental

1190

Neidhart von Reuental was one of the most famous German minnesingers. Neidhart is very well known for being rather sarcastic and comical. More melodies survive by him than from any other minnesinger.

Birth of Pérotin

1200

was a composer from around the late 12th century, associated with the Notre Dame school of polyphony in Paris and the ars antiqua musical style. Viderunt omnes, continued with organal motet Homo cum mandato, Sederunt principes, with organal motet De Stephani roseo

Cantigas de Santa Maria

1221

are 420 poems with musical notation, written in Galician-Portuguese during the reign of Alfonso X El Sabio (1221–1284) and often attributed to him. It is one of the largest collections of monophonic (solo) songs from the Middle Ages and is characterized by the mention of the Virgin Mary in every song, while every tenth song is a hymn.

Alfonso X of Castile

1221

Prolific author of Galician poetry, such as the Cantigas de Santa Maria, which are equally notable for their musical notation as for their literary merit. He commioned various works. These works included Cantigas d'escarnio e maldicer and the vast compilation Cantigas de Santa Maria , which was written in Galician-Portuguese and figures among the most important of his works. The Cantigas form one of the largest collections of vernacular monophonic songs to survive from the Middle Ages.

Adam de la Halle is born

1240

also known as Adam le Bossu (Adam the Hunchback) (1240–1287)[1] was a French-born trouvère, poet and musician. Adam's literary and musical works include chansons and jeux-partis (poetic debates) in the style of the trouvères; polyphonic rondel and motets in the style of early liturgical polyphony; and a musical play, "Jeu de Robin et Marion" (c. 1282–83), which is considered the earliest surviving secular French play with music.

Birth of W. de Wycombe

1250

Wycombe left a number of documents with his signature, including a collectarium, a precentor's workbook, two rotuli (scrolls) containing music, a summary and treatise on music, a history to which Winchecumbe added music, and also other books. His name also appears in a Reading manuscript including the rota Sumer is icumen in, and on one of seven sets of four-part compositions in the Wintonia collection.

Franco of Cologne

1250

was a German music theorist and possibly a composer. He was one of the most influential theorists of the late Medieval era, and was the first to propose an idea which was to transform musical notation permanently: that the duration of any note should be determined by its appearance on the page, and not from context alone. The result was Franconian notation.

Denis "the Poet King" of Portugal

1279

Denis studied literature and wrote several books on topics ranging from government administration to hunting, science and poetry, as well as ordering the translation of many literary works into Galician-Portuguese. He patronised troubadours, and wrote lyric poetry in the troubadour tradition himself. His best-known work is the Cantigas de Amigo, a collection of love songs as well as satirical songs, which contributed to the development of troubador poetry in the Iberian Peninsula.

Meister Rumelant

1286

was a Middle High German lyric poet. His origin is uncertain, although in his poems he referred to himself as a "Saxon". His name ("quit the land") suggests the life of a touring minstrel. He was the first to mention the 12 'tones' of the Meistersinger. His Daz Gedeones wollenvluis is a Minnelied on the subject of the mystic love of God for the Virgin Mary. He is also known to have composed songs about the death by murder of the king Erik V of Denmark, also called Glipping

Petrus de Cruce was active

1290

Composed around 1300, these motets are still considered part of the Ars Antiqua. Characteristics include further division of the triplum, the motetus and triplum move toward light and elegant expression, and a lack of concern for principles of proper textual accentuation.