Guillaume de Machaut was a medieval French poet and composer. He is regarded by many musicologists as the greatest and most important composer of the 14th century. Machaut is one of the earliest composers on whom substantial biographical information is available, and Daniel Leech-Wilkinson called him "the last great poet who was also a composer". 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 . Machaut wrote the Messe de Nostre Dame, the earliest known complete setting of the Ordinary of the Mass attributable to a single composer. Some of his best-known rondeaus are "Ma fin est mon commencement" and "Rose, liz, printemps, verdure". Wikipedia
“He who makes songs without feeling
Spoils both his words and his music.”
Qui de sentement ne fait,
Son dit et son chant contrefait.
"Remede de Fortune", line 407; translation from Josiah Fisk and Jeff Nichols (eds.) Composers on Music (Boston, Northeastern University Press, 1997) p. 5.
Et quant ma maladie<br>Garie<br>Ne sera nullement<br>Sans vous, douce anemie,<br>Qui lie<br>Estes de mon tourment,<br>A jointes mains deprie<br>Vo cuer, puis qu'il m'oublie,<br>Que temprement m'ocie,<br>Car trop langui longuement.<br>Douce dame jolie,<br>Pour dieu ne penses mie<br>Que nulle ait signourie<br>Seur moy fors vous seulement. <br class="br">"Douce dame jolie", line 33; translation by Jennifer Garnham. http://www.lib.latrobe.edu.au/MMDB/composer/H0033004.HTM
“My end is my beginning, and my beginning my end.”
Ma fin est mon commencement
Et mon commencement ma fin.
"Ma fin est mon commencement", line 1; translation from Donald N. Ferguson A History of Musical Thought (New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts, [1935] 1948) p. 94.
Et musique est une science
Qui veut qu'on rie et chante et dance.
Cure n'a de merencolie,
Ne d'homme qui merencolie
A chose qui ne puet valoir,
Eins met tels gens en nonchaloir.
Partout ou elle est joie y porte;
Les desconfortez reconforte,
Et nes seulement de l'oir
Fait elle les gens resjoir.
"Le Prologue", line 85; translation from Ross W. Duffin (ed.) A Performer's Guide to Medieval Music (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2000) p. 190.
