Music As We Know It

Probably, we would simply pass by this talented medieval composer, if he was not mentioned in the Chantilly Codex - the pivotal music manuscript of the 14th century that is considered to be one of the monuments of medieval music. His name was Johannes Cuvelier. Up to this day Johannes remains an enigma as we don’t know nothing about him before 1372 and after 1387. We don’t know the dates of his birth and death, and only by guess think that he was born in Tournai, France.

However all those rare bits of information that we possess present us an unusual for those times educated man who had big success as a composer, statesman and a poet. He also wrote biographical books, because history mentions him for the last time when he finished a manuscript about an opportunistic conqueror Bertrand du Guesclin. He was definitely a councellor of the French king Charles V, as old documents state that he was the “diseur” and “faiseur” of the monarch.

The famous Chantilly codex preserved only some of his musical works that were composed in the elaborate, elitist style known as the ars subtilior. These early French musical compositions are eccentric, whimsical, extravagant; it contains the widest diversity of emotion.

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