Les Champions des Dames
Music from the time of the Flemish Primitives
In the early 1440s, the French writer Martin le Franc dedicated Le Champion des Dames, a love poem of over 24,000 verses, to the Burgundian Duke Philip the Good. The work describes the great deeds of women throughout history and strongly supports the cause des femmes, or the struggle for equal rights for women.
The manuscript also contains the famous illustration of the composers Guillaume Du Fay and Gilles Binchois together, both in their forties at the time. Inspired by Dunstable's innovative English style, these composers broke with the complex style of the ars subtilior. Under the spell of Florentine women, antique and humanist themes, they wrote ear-catching gems and musical miniatures that were much to the liking of the Burgundian court. They thus formed a bridge from the Middle Ages to the early Renaissance.
The programme is a triptych:
from 'The glorification of woman' - ideally described by an anonymous poet as blans, blond, tout par mesure
to 'The loss of a loved one', beautifully expressed by Binchois in the ballad Deuil angoisseus, among others.
And finally, 'A new spring' and Joye sans fin.
Wiht music by Guillaume Du Fay, Nicolas Grenon, Gilles Binchois and Domenico da Piacenza
More info
artistic direction Jurgen De bruyn with Lieselot De Wilde (vocals), Dimos De Beun (recorder and clavicymbalum) and Jurgen De bruyn (lute and vocals) photo Anna Van Aarschot
