Machaut-Balladen

Ballads (love poems) and an isorhythmic motet by Guillaume de Machaut, the great French poet and composer of the 14th century, are the subject of an unhistorical interpretation and contemporary adaptation, the consequence of decades of respectful dealing with this music. The cycle ends with a double ballad by Deschamps (composed by Andrieu) from the same period, mourning the death of de Machaut, which probably happened in 1377, as 'le noble rhéthorique'.

The ballads are assigned to two alternating high tenors accompanied by the orchestra who unite in the elegiac double ballad. The vocal sections are separated by one of the great isorhythmic motets, like an interlude. Here, the arrangement does without the (sacred) text in favour of a purely instrumental reproduction of the musical text. Wolfgang Fortner