DU FAY, GUILLAUME

(?5 August 1397, Beersel, near Brussels – 27 November, 1474, Cambrai, France)

Du Fay’s compositions include seven completemasses, including oneplenary, theMissa Sancti{}Jacobi(before 1440), and 35 massordinarymovements, 15 settings of various masspropers, threeMagnificats, two settings ofBenedicamus Domino, 16polyphonic antiphons, 25 polyphonichymns, 24motets, and over 30plainchantmelodies. Earliest documents place him at Cambrai Cathedral in the summer of 1409 as a chorister.He probably attended the Council of Constance (1414–1418). In summer 1420, he entered the service of Carlo Malatesta da Rimini. In 1424 and 1425 he may have been apetit vicaireat Laon Cathedral. He was in Bologna by February 1426, having joined the household of Cardinal Louis Aleman. He next joined the papal chapel inRomeby October 1428 and remained there until July 1433. From at least 1 February 1434 he served the Duke of Savoy asmaistre de chapelle. By July 1435 Du Fay had returned to the papal chapel, then in Florence. On 9 September 1436, Pope Eugenius IV granted him a canonicate at Cambrai, and Du Fay was of-ficially received as canon there on 12 November 1436. By 6 July 1439 he had entered the service of the Duke of Burgundy but by December had taken up residence at Cambrai, where he remained until March 1450. He returned to Savoy from 1452 to 1458 asmagister{}capellae. He moved back to Cambrai as canon in October 1458 and remained there until his death.

Du Fay composed almost all his polyphony by adding third and fourth voices to a fundamental duet oftenorand cantus (soprano) voices, a premise which flowers into a wide variety of textures and genres. The motets fall into two large groups: cantilenas, freely composed treatments ofchantmelodies quite unique in the 15th century; and the more traditionalisorhythmicmotets, including the renownedNuper Rosarum Flores(1436). The mass ordinaries are not united cyclically by a common tenor until 1450, when Du Fay composed {}Missa Se La Face Ay Paleon the tenor of one of his own songs, one of the earliest examples of a secular melody used in acantus firmus mass. TheMissa Ave Regina Caelorum(c. 1464) parodies to the extent of quoting his own motet, and appears to be Du Fay’s valedictory summary of compositional techniques for masses.

See alsoTrent Codices.