Anonymous (Wolfenbüttel Chansonnier no. 29) – J’ay prins Amours

Niccolo Seligmann, vielle ​ For more content like this, subscribe to my YouTube channel, and get exclusive content by joining my Patreon community! ❤ Throughout the later Middle Ages and early Renaissance, there are several written accounts of (presumably) solo vielle players performing specific works that are usually polyphonic in manuscript sources. How were these pieces performed solo? There are three basic “poles“ between which most solo vielles performances of polyphonic music fall: cantus-over-drone, improvisation over the tenor (like the written examples in Codex Faenza), and adapted/simplified polyphony. I’m happy to say that this performance takes the third option, and goes even further: this performance is fully polyphonic, note-for-note as written, with two totally independently-phraseable/shapeable lines sounding simultaneously, as opposed to a “chord-chord-chord&quo