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• Binchois, Gilles: 8 Chansons

Binchois, Gilles: 8 Chansons

(inc. Triste plaisir, Filles a marier, etc.) for 3 voices or instruments.

Gilles Binchois was born around 1400 in Mons; he died in 1460. The earliest reference to his career comes from 1419, when he is mentioned as an organist at Mons. In the 1420s he started working for trhe Burgundian court, and he appears to have stayed there for the rest of his working life. Writers of the time frequently bracket him and Dufay as the two leading composers of their generation. The works of the two musicians are, however, rather different, that of BInchois being more circumscribed and tied to courtly forms and conventions. While Binchois´ music is more conservative than that of Dufay, he had a genuine gift for melody, and an acute sense of how to shape a phrase, as can be seen in his lovely Triste Plaisir. While most of his pieces are rondeaux (including seven of the eight pieces printed here - assuming that the text in L´ami de ma dame is incomplete), Filles a marier unusually combines two popular songs, treating one of them in imitation.
Occasionally Binchois´ treatment of dissonance may cause problems to present-day musicians used to slightly later music. However, any attempt to “improve” on the composer must take account of the hierarchical nature of his partwriting: the basic melodi material is contained in the discantus and tenor, and the contratenor is not only subordinate to these two, but actually optional.
In this edition the original note values have been quartered in nos 6. and 8, both of which are exceptional in Binchois´ output, but halved in the remaining pieces. Editorial accidentals are printed small above the stave, applying to the one note only; the original accidentals are taken as applying to the whole bar. Ligatures are shown by the usual square brackets, but coloration (red notes in black notation and black notes in white notation, indicating hemiola-like rhythms) is not shown in the edition. See the complete edition of Binchois´ chansons by Wolfgang Rehm. (Musikalische Denkmäler, Band II) for more details. I am grateful to Jeannine Alton for editing and translating the texts of these songs.