Adam de la Halle (1245–50 – 1285–8/after 1306) was a French poet-composer ''

trouvère ''Trouvère'' (, ), sometimes spelled ''trouveur'' (, ), is the Northern French (''langue d'oïl'') form of the ''langue d'oc'' (Occitan) word ''trobador'', the precursor of the modern French word ''troubadour''. ''Trouvère'' refers to poet- ...

''. Among the few medieval composers to write both

monophonic Monaural or monophonic sound reproduction (often shortened to mono) is sound intended to be heard as if it were emanating from one position. This contrasts with stereophonic sound or ''stereo'', which uses two separate audio channels to reproduc ...

and

polyphonic Polyphony ( ) is a type of musical texture consisting of two or more simultaneous lines of independent melody, as opposed to a musical texture with just one voice, monophony, or a texture with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords, h ...

music, in this respect he has been considered both a conservative and progressive composer, resulting in a complex legacy: he cultivated admired representatives of older trouvère genres, but also experimented with newer dramatic works. Adam represented the final generation of the ''trouvère'' tradition and "has long been regarded as one of the most important musical and literary figures of thirteenth-century Europe". Adam's literary and musical works include

chanson A (, , french: chanson française, link=no, ; ) is generally any lyric-driven French song, though it most often refers to the secular polyphonic French songs of late medieval and Renaissance music. The genre had origins in the monophonic s ...

s and jeux-partis (poetic debates) in the style of the ''trouvères'';

rondel and

motet In Western classical music, a motet is mainly a vocal musical composition, of highly diverse form and style, from high medieval music to the present. The motet was one of the pre-eminent polyphonic forms of Renaissance music. According to Margar ...

s in the style of early liturgical polyphony; and a musical play, ''

Jeu de Robin et Marion ''Le Jeu de Robin et de Marion'' is reputedly the earliest French secular play with music, written in around 1282 or 1283,''Hutchinson Encyclopedia'' (1988), p.10 and is the most famous work of Adam de la Halle. It was performed at the Angevin Cou ...

'' (), which is considered the earliest surviving

secular Secularity, also the secular or secularness (from Latin ''saeculum'', "worldly" or "of a generation"), is the state of being unrelated or neutral in regards to religion. Anything that does not have an explicit reference to religion, either negativ ...

French play with music. He was a member of the

Confrérie des jongleurs et bourgeois d'Arras The Confrérie des jongleurs et bourgeois d'Arras was a fraternity of ''jongleurs'' founded in Arras, France in or around 1175. As its name implies, it was intended for ''jongleurs'' (not just trouvères) and the bourgeoisie, not just the knightl ...

, a

fraternity A fraternity (from Latin language, Latin ''wiktionary:frater, frater'': "brother (Christian), brother"; whence, "wiktionary:brotherhood, brotherhood") or fraternal organization is an organization, society, club (organization), club or fraternal ...

jongleur A minstrel was an entertainer, initially in medieval Europe. It originally described any type of entertainer such as a musician, juggler, acrobat, singer or fool; later, from the sixteenth century, it came to mean a specialist entertainer who ...

Life and career

A, "le Bossu d'Arras" and "Adam d'Arras", suggest that he came from

Arras, France Arras ( , ; pcd, Aro; historical nl, Atrecht ) is the prefecture of the Pas-de-Calais department, which forms part of the region of Hauts-de-France; before the reorganization of 2014 it was in Nord-Pas-de-Calais. The historic centre of the A ...

. The sobriquet "the

Hunchback Kyphosis is an abnormally excessive convex curvature of the spine as it occurs in the thoracic and sacral regions. Abnormal inward concave ''lordotic'' curving of the cervical and lumbar regions of the spine is called lordosis. It can result fr ...

" was probably a family name; Adam himself points out that he was not one. His father, Henri de la Halle, was a well-known Citizen of Arras, and Adam studied

grammar In linguistics, the grammar of a natural language is its set of structure, structural constraints on speakers' or writers' composition of clause (linguistics), clauses, phrases, and words. The term can also refer to the study of such constraint ...

theology Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing the ...

, and music at the

Cistercian The Cistercians, () officially the Order of Cistercians ( la, (Sacer) Ordo Cisterciensis, abbreviated as OCist or SOCist), are a Catholic religious order of monks and nuns that branched off from the Benedictines and follow the Rule of Saint ...

abbey An abbey is a type of monastery used by members of a religious order under the governance of an abbot or abbess. Abbeys provide a complex of buildings and land for religious activities, work, and housing of Christian monks and nuns. The conce ...

of Vaucelles, near

Cambrai Cambrai (, ; pcd, Kimbré; nl, Kamerijk), formerly Cambray and historically in English Camerick or Camericke, is a city in the Nord (French department), Nord Departments of France, department and in the Hauts-de-France Regions of France, regio ...

. Father and son had their share in the civil discords in Arras, and for a short time had been destined for the church, but renounced this intention, and married a certain Marie, who features in many of his songs, '' rondeaux'',

s and '' jeux-partis''. Afterwards he joined the household of

Robert II, Count of Artois Robert II (September 1250 – 11 July 1302) was the Count of Artois, the posthumous son and heir of Robert I and Matilda of Brabant. He was a nephew of Louis IX of France. He died at the Battle of the Golden Spurs. Life An experienced soldier, ...

; and then was attached to

Charles of Anjou Charles I (early 1226/12277 January 1285), commonly called Charles of Anjou, was a member of the royal Capetian dynasty and the founder of the second House of Anjou. He was Count of Provence (1246–85) and Forcalquier (1246–48, 1256–85) i ...

, brother of

Louis IX Louis IX (25 April 1214 – 25 August 1270), commonly known as Saint Louis or Louis the Saint, was King of France from 1226 to 1270, and the most illustrious of the Direct Capetians. He was crowned in Reims at the age of 12, following the d ...

, whose fortunes he followed in Egypt, Syria, Palestine, and Italy. At the court of Charles, after Charles became king of

Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

, Adam wrote his ''

'', the most famous of his works.

Works

His known works include thirty-six chansons (literally, "songs"), forty-six ''rondets de carole'', eighteen ''jeux-partis'', fourteen '' rondeaux'', five

s, one '' rondeau-virelai'', one ''ballette'', one ''dit d'amour'', and one ''congé''. Adam's shorter pieces are accompanied by music, of which a transcript in modern notation, with the original score, is given in

Edmond de Coussemaker Charles Edmond Henri de Coussemaker (19 April 1805 – 10 January 1876) was a French musicologist and ethnologist focusing mainly on the cultural heritage of French Flanders. With Michiel de Swaen and Maria Petyt, he was one of the most eminent d ...

's edition. His ''Jeu de Robin et Marion'' is cited as the earliest French play with music on a secular subject. The

pastoral A pastoral lifestyle is that of shepherds herding livestock around open areas of land according to seasons and the changing availability of water and pasture. It lends its name to a genre of literature, art, and music (pastorale) that depicts ...

, which tells how Marion resisted the knight, and remained faithful to Robert the shepherd, is based on an old chanson, ''Robin m'aime, Robin m'a''. It consists of dialogue varied by refrains already current in popular song. The melodies to which these are set have the character of

folk music Folk music is a music genre that includes traditional folk music and the contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be called world music. Traditional folk music has b ...

, and are more spontaneous and melodious than the more elaborate music of his songs and motets. Fétis considered ''Le Jeu de Robin et Marion'' and ''Le Jeu de la feuillée'' forerunners of the

comic opera Comic opera, sometimes known as light opera, is a sung dramatic work of a light or comic nature, usually with a happy ending and often including spoken dialogue. Forms of comic opera first developed in late 17th-century Italy. By the 1730s, a ne ...

.François-Joseph Fétis, ''Revue Musicale'' 1.1, 1827. An adaptation of ''Le Jeu Robin et Marion'', by

Julien Tiersot Julien Tiersot (5 July 1857, in Bourg-en-Bresse (Rhône-Alpes) – 10 August 1936, in Paris), was a French musicologist, composer and a pioneer in ethnomusicology. Biography Tiersot was first keenly interested in popular French music, on which ...

, was played at Arras by a company from the Paris

Opéra-Comique The Opéra-Comique is a Paris opera company which was founded around 1714 by some of the popular theatres of the Parisian fairs. In 1762 the company was merged with – and for a time took the name of – its chief rival, the Comédie-Italienne ...

on the occasion of a festival in 1896 in honour of Adam de le Hale. His other play, ''Le jeu Adan'' or ''Le jeu de la Feuillee'' (ca. 1262), is a

satirical Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming or e ...

drama in which he introduces himself, his father and the citizens of Arras with their peculiarities. His works include a ''congé'', or satirical farewell to the city of Arras, and an unfinished ''

chanson de geste The ''chanson de geste'' (, from Latin 'deeds, actions accomplished') is a medieval narrative, a type of epic poem that appears at the dawn of French literature. The earliest known poems of this genre date from the late 11th and early 12th cen ...

'' in honour of Charles of Anjou, ''Le roi de Secile'', begun in 1282; another short piece, ''Le jeu du pelerin'', is sometimes attributed to him.

Editions

* article by Paulin Paris in: ''Histoire litteraire de La France'' (vol. xx. pp. 638–675) *The edition of Adam's two jeux in: Monmerqué and Michel's ''Theatre francais au moyen age'' (1842) *''Oeuvres completes'' (1872), edited by E. de Coussemaker. *

Ernest Langlois Ernest Langlois ( Heippes, 4 September 1857 – Lille, 15 July 1924) was a French medievalist, professor at the University of Lille. He is best known for his 1910 work ''Les manuscrits du Roman de la Rose, description et classement'', on the manus ...

, ''Le jeu de Robin et Marion'' (1896), with a translation in modern French *''A Guesnon, La Satire a Arras au XIIIe, siecle'' (1900) *''Canchons et Partures des... Adan delle Hale'', a critical edition by Rudolf Berger,(Halle, 1900) * Nigel Wilkins, The Lyric Works of Adam de la Halle, ed., Corpus Musicae, Vol.44,

American Institute of Musicology The American Institute of Musicology (AIM) is a musicological organization that researches, promotes and produces publications on early music. Founded in 1944 by Armen Carapetyan, the AIM's chief objective is the publication of modern editions ...

, 1967. * Recent French ed. of complete works: edited by Pierre-Yves Badel (Paris: Livre de poche, 1995) ()

Recordings

* 1955 – Adam de La Halle. ''Le jeu de Robin et de Marion''; ''13 rondeaux'' (Raimbaut de Vaqueiras, Guillaume d'Amiens, Anon.). Pro Musica Antiqua, Brussels, Safford Cape, conductor. Recorded 23 June 1953, in the Palais des Academies, Brussels. Archiv Produktion II. Research Period: The Central Middle Ages. Series A: Troubadours, Trouvères and Minnesingers; Series B: Music of the Minstrels; Series C: Early Polyphony before 1300. LP recording, 1 disc: analog, monaural, rpm, 12 in. ermany Archiv Produktion. * 1991 – Adam de La Halle. ''Le jeu de Robin et Marion''. Ensemble Perceval, Guy Robert, director. Recorded 1980. CD recording, 1 disc: digital, stereo, in. Arion ARN 68162. France: Arion. * 1991 – Adam de La Halle. ''Le jeu de Robin et Marion''. Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, Thomas Binkley, cond. Recorded May 1987 at the Barfüsserkirche in Basel, Switzerland. CD recording, 1 disc: digital, stereo, in. Focus 913. loomington, Ind. Focus. * 1998 – "Robin Loves Me" arranged for solo guitar (and performed by) Gareth Koch as the final track of his "Carmina Burana" CD released by ABC Classics in 2006. * 2004 – Zodiac. Ars Nova and

Ars Subtilior ''Ars subtilior'' (Latin for 'subtler art') is a musical style characterized by rhythmic and notational complexity, centered on Paris, Avignon in southern France, and also in northern Spain at the end of the fourteenth century.Hoppin 1978, 47 ...

in the Low Countries and Europe''

Capilla Flamenca Capilla Flamenca is a vocal and instrumental early music consort based in Leuven, Belgium. The group specialises in 14th to 16th century music from Flanders and takes its name from the historical Flemish chapel (capilla flamenca), the choir of the c ...

. Eufoda 1360. * 2006 – Adam de La Halle. ''D'amoureus cuer voel chanter'', Anne Delafosse-Quentin, Les Jardins de Courtoisie, Zig Zag Territoires (ZZT070401) *2019 – Noel Akchoté. Adam de La Halle – Le Doux Regard de ma Dame. Self published.

References

Citations

Sources

* *

External links

Extensive bibliography
of Adam de la Halle and his works * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Adam de la Halle 1237 births 1288 deaths 13th-century French poets 13th-century French composers French male classical composers Trouvères People from Arras French male dramatists and playwrights French male poets Medieval male composers 13th-century French dramatists and playwrights