DESCRIPTION:
Music of the Middle Ages
An Anthology for Performance and Study by
David Fenwick Wilson
ISBN 0-02-872952-8 Schirmer Books

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Part X The Polyphonic Song in France

1. Guillaume de Machaut - Dame, vostre doulze viaire (virelai) (0:00)
2. Machaut - Se je soruspir (virelai) (1:33)
3. Machaut - Puis qu'en oubli (rondeau) (3:13)
4. Machaut - Quant je ne voy (rondeau) (4:31)
5. Machaut - Amours me fuit desirer (ballade) (5:58)
6. Machaut - De toutes flours (ballade) (7:32)

The Hilliard Ensemble

The virelai as a song form of the 14th and early 15th century usually has three stanzas, and a refrain that is stated before the first stanza and again after each. Within each stanza, the structure is that of the bar form, with two sections that share the same rhymes and music ("stollen"), followed by a third ("abgesang"). The third section of each stanza shares its rhymes and music with the refrain.

The musical rondeau is typically a two-part composition, with all the "A" sections of the poem's AB-aAab-AB structure set to one line of music, and all the "B" parts to another.

he musical form of a ballade stanza is a bar form (AAB), with a first, repeated musical section (stollen) setting the two initial pairs of verses (rhymes "ab–ab"), and the second section (abgesang) setting the remaining lines including the refrain verse ("bcbC"). The two statements of the "A" section often have different endings, known as "ouvert" and "clos" respectively, with the harmony of the "ouvert" ending leading back to the beginning and that of the "clos" ending leading forward into the "B" section. In many ballades, the final part of the "B" section may reintroduce melodic material referring back to the end of the "A" part, a feature known as "musical rhyme" (or, in German, Rücklaufballade). An alternative form employed by Machaut, known as ballade duplex or balladelle, has the B part also divided into two repetitions, with the refrain line sung as part of the repetition.