Adam de la Halle

c. 1240–c. 1285

Performer
Poet
Composer

The Last of the TrouvÈres.

Adam de la Halle (c. 1240–c. 1285) is considered to be the last of the trouvères, the poet-musicians of northern France who specialized in writing poems and songs of courtly love. He was born in Arras in northern France (Picardy) and later probably studied in Paris. Also known as "Adam le Bossu" (bossu = hunchback), he is known for having written one of the earliest recorded secular dramas in French, a 1,099-line satiric play (apparently intended for performance at a local festival) that ridicules character traits of some of the citizens of Arras. Manuscripts of this work include music since songs were a part of the play, which had little plot but was full of proverbs and puns. Sometime after 1276, Adam entered into the service of Robert II, the count of Artois, and accompanied him to Naples where he wrote a poem about Charles d'Anjou, king of Sicily. He was celebrated as a singer as well as a poet-composer, and may have performed at a royal feast in England. His compositions include works both in the traditional monophonic style of the trouvères and also in the newly emerging polyphonic style. He wrote a number of love songs and a 780-line work closely related to the pastourelle, the famous Jeu de Robin et de Marion (Play of Robin and of Marion).

sources

The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. 29 vols. 2nd ed. Eds. Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell (New York: Grove's Dictionaries, 2001).