Guillaume Dufay's Chansons: A More Precise Melancholy

Album: Guillaume Dufay: Tempio dell'Onore e delle Vertù
Track: "Ma belle dame souverainne" (Track #4)
Composer: Guillaume Dufay
Instruments: 4 vocalists
Musical Form: Rondeau
Year: ~1420-1430

A simple-minded approach to the music of the Burgundian School might involve a survey of Guillaume Dufay's masses and motets, leaving Binchois as the sole purveyor of early-15th-century secular music. Although you wouldn't be far off the mark with that approach, Dufay's body of secular compositions is nothing to sneeze at. Fortunately, Cantica Symphonia recorded 18 of Dufay's chansons in Guillaume Dufay: Tempio dell'Onore e delle Vertù, showcasing this great composer's gift for melody as well as contrapuntal precision.

The result is a mixed bag. Dufay's style of epic, unrestrained polyphony is particularly well suited to songs that indulge in melancholy, such as "Ma belle dame souverainne." However, his more upbeat chansons, like "Navré je sui d'un art penetratif," have a tendency to sound bouncy and a tad frivolous. Perhaps it is actually the simplicity demanded by the genre that Dufay so struggles with -- one who makes a living adorning cathedral halls might struggle painting a portrait...

I think there is no question that Binchois is more graceful in his ability to relate to the optimism of the masses, but when Dufay strikes a sad chord, I find I am often slow to recover.

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