ARS SUBTILIOR !
The Chantilly Codex
Submitted for your delectation and edification is the Baude Cordier Heart of Music of c. 1405 that is part of the famed Chantilly Codex of c. 1390, This fascinating Musical Heart was added by the composer Baude Cordier a few years after the Codex was printed.
Note the musical score and rhythmic markings within the heart.
The Chantilly manuscript, Musée Condé no. 564, both celebrated and notorious for the extremely complicated notation of the ars subtilior, but also admired for the decorative aspect of some of its pages, comprises, in the five fascicles of its original corpus, seventy ballades,seventeen rondeaux, twelve virelays and thirteen isorhythmic motets, all of them compositions of the second half of the fourteenth century.
The piece "Belle, Bonne, Sage, Plaisant" was written by Cordier to a special lady for the New Year, and reflects the shape of the notation with the text (“Lovely, good, wise, and pleasant”)
The graphic layout of the notation is a play on words on the "Cor" ("heart") in "Cordier".
Composers in the Codex includeJohannes Symonis, Jehan Suzay, P. des Molins, Goscalch, Solage, Baude Cordier, Grimace, Guillaume de Machaut, Jehan Vaillant, Franciscus Andrieu, Johannes Cuvelier, Rodericus, Trebor, and Jacob Senleches.
