Author
Raimbaut de Vaqueiras (Southern French, c. 1155-1207):
- Was a troubador
- the son of a "poor knight" from Provence
- primarily performed in Italian courts
- died in 1207, in battle during the Fourth Crusade
- Wikipedia article
Time and Place
- Late twelfth Century
- Southern France
- Sung primarily in royal courts
About the Piece
(much of the description comes from elements that were brought out by Forney and Machlis, The Enjoyment of Music, and the accompanying DVD)- Genre is Estampie, a type of dance song performed by a troubadour
- Instruments include a rebec, a pipe, a guitarra moresca, and nakers; however instrumental parts are improvised.
- form is strophic which means the same melody is repeated with every stanza of the poem
- the melody takes the form AABBCC
- language is (Old) French
- title means "The first of May"
- the text was written as a poem
- compared to sacred music of this era, the singer moves through the text very quickly, as if he is telling a story.
- triple meter
- sounds like a song to dance to
Purpose
- Love song to Beatrice, marquise of Montferrat
- Primarily for entertainment
Reflections
This is a fun piece, but I feel like I'm missing something. It feels that the piece is written to tell a story, but I can't understand the story because the music is in another language. Consequently, even though I have the translated words sitting right in front of me, I feel "left out". I don't know which word corresponds to which English word, so I don't know what the melody is emphasizing. Otherwise, though, the song seems much more advanced than I would have expected of a Medieval work. I would not have thought a piece like that was that old.