Product Review

Catchy popular tunes are not a modern invention. Neither are poet-musicians with uniquely poignant, pertinent comments about life and love. All these things were very much a part of life in 12th- and 13th-century France, represented in the vast repertoire of the trouveres (northern provinces) and troubadours (southern provinces). This disc explores a tiny fraction of trouvere songs exemplified in the grand chant,a protracted meditation on the fortunes of loving, the jeu parti,a debate concerning questions of love, the chanson de toile,a song women sang as they embroidered, the pastourelle, the descort, the balade, and dansa. Each of these types of song had a particular poetic form and subject. Five different singers, unaccompanied or variously joined by bagpipe, percussion, fiddle, or medieval lute, give engaging and musically solid interpretations that deserve serious attention by all lovers of early music and singing. --David Vernier