Page 35 - (DK) The Classical Music Book - Big Ideas Simply Explained

EARLY MUSIC 1000–1400 33

See also: Missa l’homme armé 42 ■ Water Music 84–89 ■ Musique de Adam de la Halle
table 106 ■ The Magic Flute 134–137 ■ Die schöne Müllerin 150–155
French musician Adam de la
Halle was born in the cloth-
working city of Arras in 1222,
and grew up learning about
music as part of his theological
education at the abbey of
Vaucelles, founded only a
century before. De la Halle’s
father expected him to enter
the Church, but he chose a
different path. After a short-
lived marriage, he enrolled at
the University of Paris, where,
among other things, he learned
the polyphonic techniques
that he would later apply to
popular musical genres.
De la Halle initially used
his verse to speak out against
the corrupt administration of
Arras but later entered into
noble service. It was in the
service of Charles of Anjou,
who became king of Naples,
Le Jeu de Robin et de Marion was (where oïl meant “yes”). Each of that he wrote Le jeu de Robin
performed in St. Petersburg, Russia, these languages had its own et de Marion. Halle died a few
in 1907. Its set design was recorded in bardic tradition: the south had the years later, sometime between
watercolor by Mstislav Dobuzhinsky. 1285 and 1288.
music of the trobador and female
trobairitz, while the north used
The sources of European secular the word “trouvère,” both of which Other key works
music tended to be found where may have come from the Early
popular styles aroused the interest French word trobar, meaning Date unknown Mout me fu
of the Church or nobility. The “to find or invent” (a song). An grief/Robin m’aime/Portare
(Great was my sadness/Robin
crusading knights of southern alternative root may be the Arabic loves me/Portare)
France found the highly developed word tarab, meaning “source of joy.” Date unknown A jointes
styles of instrumental and vocal One of the earliest troubadours, mains vous proi (Take my
music they encountered on William IX, Duke of Aquitaine, hand, I pray)
Crusades in the Holy Land was said to have sung “in verse
particularly appealing, this being with pleasant tunes” about his
a period of great cultural exchange experience of leading the so-called Le jeu de Robin et de Marion (“The
as well as of conflict and hostility. “Crusade of the Faint-Hearted” Play of Robin and Marion”) for his
into Anatolia (now Turkey) in 1101. fellow Frenchmen as part of a
Languages and influences His songs are clearly influenced Christmas celebration in Naples
Medieval secular music features by Arabic poetic conventions, in in 1284. The French noblemen had
distinct poetic identities linked to particular the popular song-forms taken refuge there after the island
regional languages. Two medieval of muwashah and zajal. of Sicily had overthrown the rule of
French languages emerged from Charles I of Anjou (Adam’s patron)
Latin: langue d’oc or Occitan in A play with music in a bloody Easter coup. The Jeu
Southern France and Northern The 13th-century musician Adam tells the story of a country maid
Spain (where oc meant “yes”); and de la Halle has been described as a who is wooed by a lustful knight
langue d’oïl, north of the Loire trouvère. De la Halle probably wrote yet remains true to her lover ❯❯

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