Je m’esbais de vous, mon cueur 3v ·
Busnoys, Antoine
Appearance in the group of related chansonniers:
*Dijon ff. 53v-54 »Je m’esbais de vous mon cueur« 3v Busnoys · Edition · Facsimile
This page with edition as a PDF
Editions: Busnoys 2018 no. 21, Droz 1927 p. 94, Rodin 2018 p. 48.
Text: Rondeau cinquain; full text; also in Berlin 78.B.17 ff. 114-114v in a slightly different version, ed.: Löpelmann 1927, p. 195.
Je m’esbais de vous, mon cueur, Vray est que tant a de valeur je m’esbais de vous, mon cueur, Deportez vous, c’est le milleur, Je m’esbais de vous, mon cueur, |
You startle me, my heart,
It is true that she has such worth
you startle me, my heart,
Go away, that is the best,
You startle me, my heart,
|
1) Berlin 78.B.17, line 4, “... qu’elle a fait cesse”
2) Berlin 78.B.17, line 5, “... c’est grant erreur”
3) Berlin 78.B.17, lines 14-16, “... j’en amasse a largesse / puisque doncq n’avons que tristesse / en cest estat et tout malleur.”
Evaluation of the source:
The Dijon scribe copied this song with only a single error in the music, a missing note in the contratenor. In the second half of the rondeau a curious flat before the note f appears in the contratenor (b. 18.2). It is simply a caution for the singer: The first time he sang a descending figure starting on f, he had to flatten the following e; this time it is not the case, therefore the f has been marked clearly as fa.
Comments on text and music:
“Je m’esbais de vous, mon cueur” is a courtly archetype in rich rimes. An abandoned lover is furious about being left by his mistress, but astonished that his heart still loves her. The setting is quite unusual: It has an upper voice moving within a restricted range (c'-c’’) and it does not display one single cadential inflection; it keeps to the hexachord on f' expanded by the hexachord below on c'. The tenor is in a more normal range (f-a’) and much more expansive with cadential inflections towards c' (bb. 5 and 9) and towards d' (b. 19). The contratenor (Bb-f') starts above the tenor (bb. 1-3), but for the remainder keeps below as a supporting voice.
The hexachordal simplicity of the setting is close to being demonstrative. It is normal that two voices at a given time sing in the same hexachord, at the same level or an octave apart, while the third voice proceeds in a hexachord a fifth above or a fifth below. But in the small chanson format it is unusual that they keep on doing so for longer passages or in such a straightforward way. The opening of this rondeau is typical, and it keeps on in the same way. For example, in the third line leading to the middle cadence the upper voices sing F-hexachords (with decorative expansions), while the contratenor first runs through a C-hexachord (bb. 10-12) and then changes the colour by a turn to the Bb-hexachord (bb. 12-13); at the start of the second section (b. 14) it announces the return to the F-hexachord emphatically. A simple and effective procedure.
The basic technique of polyphony combined with the absence of cadential figures in the upper voice, except for the final and middle cadences, permits the composer to set the poetic lines as a continuous stream of music – much enhanced by the active tenor. The second and third lines both are highlighted by canonic imitation in the upper voices, unison and at the octave, but this happens without any disruption of the flow, because the discantus functions are handled by the tenor – and quite unobtrusively, displaced and prolonged in bars 5-6, interrupted in bars 9-10.
Rhythmically the song is in triple time, and from the start it innocently signals this pattern. However, very soon double time seems eager to take over the action with displaced cadences, the ligatures in the second half, etc. In the rondeau’s second section black notation in the lower voices (bb. 20-21) enforces a hemiola effect culminating in a harsh dissonance on “de nous amer”. Tenor and contratenor hold the “forbidden” diminished fifth bb-e for a full brevis value, while the upper voice lingers on a' before resolving the tension with a flourish leading to the final passage. This deliberate dissonance is clearly marked in the chansonnier by in flat before f in bar 18, a fa-sign which warns the singer of the contratenor to stay in the c-hexachord. This surely originated with the composer and demonstrates his awareness of his use of daring effects in an on the surface simple song.
“Je m’esbais” is the subject for a recent article by Jesse Rodin, ‘The Songbook as Sensory Artifact’, which I strongly recommend for further reading. (1) At the end of the article the song is the subject of a “sensory analysis”, a close reading of the music formed as a discussion between the members of a group of singers and an informed listener: “Let us imagine, then, that we are seated in a dining hall somewhere in Southern France. The year is 1475 ... We are reflecting on our dinnertime performance ... And we are privileged to have in front of us a recently copied chansonnier known today as Dijon.” (pp. 36-46, at p. 37).
A funny, and probably unavoidable, detail is that the participants in this dialogue are in fact not looking at the Dijon chansonnier, but either at the edition in the Trois chansonniers of 1927 or Rodin’s in the appendix to the article, which both have a different poetic text and disregard the ligatures. And a group of singers in 1475 would certainly have discussed the song’s hexachordal use or at least have remarked shortly on the flat sign before f in bar 18. This sign has been suppressed in both modern editions.
PWCH April 2022
1) Jesse Rodin, ‘The Songbook as Sensory Artifact’ in Griffiths, F. and Starkey, K. (eds.), Sensory Reflections: Traces of Experience in Medieval Artifacts. Berlin & Boston 2018, pp. 22-49.