Philippe De Vitry

According to the text books Anthology for Music in Western Civilization and Music in Western Civilization, this piece was composed by Philippe de Vitry in 14th century France. It is an ars nova motet so the text was usually political, satirical, or hermetic and was usually written and understood by the educated elite who attended universities. This work was an example of Philippe’s involvement in royal politics; he expressed his criticism toward the corrupt court. This piece was a contribution to the Roman de Fauvel, a multi-media political allegory about corruption in the French government. Thus, this work was not written for any particular liturgical occasion, however it does reference parts of the Old Testament to create a mixture of both

Philippe is described as a poet so it is no surprise that we can see that his Latin text does display a rhyme pattern. Through analysis of the text I have concluded that the rhyme pattern used by Philippe in the triplum is ABAB, BCBC, CDCD, DCDC, CECE, and EDED. Thus, there is an alternating pattern between the lines. A rhyme pattern can also be seen in the duplum though I was not sure what the exact pattern

This is because the original chant voice is in the tenor and the chant has never been identified so it is referred to as Neuma. The tenor line is very important because it gives stability and structure to the overall piece. This is because the tenor line displays an example of an isorhythm. Through the textbook and through analysis, we can see that the tenor line repeats the same 10 measure rhythm pattern three times in a row before repeating those three a second/final time. The triplum and duplum are very fast paced and are sung in a style that is hard to follow so having the isorhythm in the tenor part helps ground the piece and keeping it in a structured meter. The rhythm in this piece is a combination of triple and duple; this combination can be clearly seen in the tenor line because it alternates between the two rhythmic styles for about five measures in middle of each talea (repeated rhythmic pattern). (Simms,