Hayden 1

Among the known secular music of the early renaissance, the popularity of the song

Lhomme arm is unrivaled. It stands apart from other tunes of the day in the sense that over

forty mass Ordinaries written by a plethora of composers from the time use Lhomme arm as

their cantus firmus, largely thanks to the melodys highly transformable construction. With this

paper, I will present a brief history of the tune and its origins, and I will examine how the melody

is developed and manipulated in the cantus firmus masses of Johannes Ockeghem and Guillaume

Dufay. Research on the history of the melody and the many masses involved in the tradition of

this theme has been well conducted and is in no short supply; albeit the melody itself is of an

unknown or, at best, heavily disputed origin.

The approximate date of composition and whether the secular song was composed

outside of the masses or simply passed down through an oral tradition are issues of particular

interest to scholars due to the lack of consensus concerning their answers. One of the leading

musicologists in the field of Renaissance Music makes the case for the tunes intentional

composition by an unknown composer saying that because of the seemingly maladroit length of

the song31 beats including the final noteand the potential symbolism of that number as it

relates to the number of chevaliers who were members of the Order of the Golden Fleecean

assembly of knights which served the Burgundian court in the fifteenth centuryit is safe to

assume that the tune was composed by an individual with ties to the court sometime between

1433 and 1434.1 This date range stems from the fact that in late 1433, the number of chevaliers in

the Order grew by six from 25 to 31 so as to accommodate the birth of Charles the Bold who

would be joining the order.2 Planchart also cites the length of the melody as evidence against its
1 . Alejandro Planchart, The Origins and Early History of Lhomme arm, Journal of Musicology 20, no.
3 (Summer 2003): 311-313.

2. Ibid., 313.
 Hayden 2

possible beginning as a mere folksong. He says that attempts to divide the songs 31 beatsor

30 beats depending on if one includes the final noteinto groupings typical of 15th century,

western rhythmic phraseology yield highly unlikely results.3

Such ideas concerning the songs origin, however convincing they may or may not be, are far

from shared among all of those in the field. In the debate about this infamous melody, it is also

contested whether or not the songs genesis was as a monophonic folksong or as the tenor of the

three-part chanson entitled Il sera par vous Lhomme arm. Lewis Lockwood, on the contrary,

doubts both of the aforementioned theories.4 His interpretation is that propositions concerning

the rhythmic structure and complexity of the song being somehow indicative of its compositional

origin as well as assertions of its start as a tenor in another song are not yet well enough

supported by evidence to be definitive and yet could each very well be true; he claims that there

are no inherent contradictions in the supposition that the theme was composed monophonically

and was then made to be a tenor in a chanson all the while still gaining popularity in its original

form.5 Such ambiguity speaks to the difficulty in determining facts from this period given the

lack of records kept at the time around which this composition first appeared.

In terms of the masses by Ockeghem and Dufay based on Lhomme arm, scholars are having a

similar discussion on their origins as well, specifically in reference to their chronology. Planchart

notes in great detail that the masses of these two composers are quite generally accepted as being

the earliest masses in the tradition as various studies attest to the later dating of the Lhomme
3. Planchart, The Origins and Early History, 311.

4. Lewis Lockwood, Aspects of the Lhomme arm Tradition, Proceedings of the Royal Musical
Association 100 (1973 1974): 99.

5. Ibid., 100.
 Hayden 3

arm masses by other composers.6 Of the two compositions however, Planchart asserts that

Dufays mass predates that of Ockeghem based on the following two ways in which Ockeghem

imitates the mass of Dufayfirstly in terms of tessitura and counterpoint at the start of the mass

which is not at all characteristic of Ockeghem himself and secondly by way of modal structure in

the Agnus Dei which closely resembles the structure used in Dufays mass while the overall

texture returns to Ockeghems personal style.7 In opposition to Plancharts view, some are of the

mind that Ockeghems use of major prolation mensuration signs for the cantus firmus indicate

the greater age of his mass.8 However, Agostino Margo refutes this assertion by pointing out that

many if not most of the other Lhomme arm masses which are known to be composed after the

two in question also make free use of major prolations in the tenor.9 While acknowledging

Plancharts claim about Dufays influence on his contemporarys mass setting, Margo

nonetheless points out that Ockeghems mass is known to have been copied between 1467 and

1468 in Bruges, France while the earliest copying of Dufays setting was around 1469-1470 in

the Lucca 238 codex.10

In opposition to the varying questions still up to speculation concerning the history and origins of

these masses, their uses of the cantus firmus is generally well understood. Lhomme arm is a

6. Planchart, The Origins and Early History, 327.

7. Ibid., 332.

8. Agostino Margo, Varietas et uniformit dans la messe LHomme arm de Guillaume Dufay, Musurgia
7, no. 1 (2000): 9.

9. Ibid.

10. Ibid., 8-9.

 Hayden 4

remarkable song in terms of the ease with which composers may use the melody as a tenor when

one considers its overall construction. Written in a concise ABA form, the different sections of

the song are each restricted to two distinct divisions within the mixolydian mode (g-g)the first

being confined to the bottom pentachord (g-d) and the second being sung in the top tetrachord

(d-g) with the exception of a lone a that we find in the B section.11 Throughout the song, the

melody is mostly linear save a few leaps of only fourths or fifths within the respective ranges of

each section, and the contrasting step-wise motions in the A section against the movement of

returning to the previous note which is characteristic of the B section help to give the song a

motivic and memorable attraction.12 With a structure as such and lyrics written so that the end of

each phrase rhymes with one another, it is easily conceivable that the tune was quite widely

popular by the end of the fifteenth and well into the sixteenth century.

Both Dufay and Ockeghem each treat the song in very different and puzzling ways. For the

purposes of this work of which the chanson itself is the focus, I will avoid a large harmonic or

modal analysis and focus solely on the utilization of the tune Lhomme arm in each respective

mass. I will start my analyses of the two masses with Ockeghems Missa Lhomme arm which,

according to Lockwood, could almost be categorized as a missa brevis due to its relatively short

duration.13 Perhaps most immediately noticeable from the score, aside from the brevity of the

setting, is that the cantus firmusheld in the traditional tenor position in the Credo, Gloria, and

Sanctus, but which moves to the lowest sounding voice in the Credo and Agnus deiis paired

11. Lockwood, 105.

12. Ibid.

13. Ibid., 113.

 Hayden 5

with the original French lyrics of the chanson throughout the mass.14 Van Benthem proposes that

a plausible explanation as to why Ockeghem keeps the original text lies in the masss potential

premier in a ceremony in which St. Martins relics were moved to the royal abbey of Saint-

Martin in Tours, France.15 Benthem states that such a performance of the mass, one with a voice

singing in French that is, would have almost assuredly been necessary for this type of occasion,

and he claims that the inclusion of lyrics from the cantus firmus in all voices simultaneously in

mm. 78-79 of the Credo as well as in two voices in mm. 96-97 of the same movement support

his theory.16

An additional factor which is evident upon examination of the score is the incredible exactness

with which Ockeghem maintains the integrity of the chanson amidst the other voices. There are

no evident signs of diminution or any significant changes in rhythm within a mass section when

compared to the original theme, and with the exceptions of the Kyrie and the last section of the

Credo, the song is only ever heard in its entirety.17 In total, the ABA theme is repeated eight times

throughout the mass: once in the Kyriemissing only the last four notes of the first A section

twice in the Gloria, three times in the Credoexcusing the return to A in the last repetition

which is instead replaced by a free codaonce fully in the Sanctus, and once fully in the Agnus

14. Jaap van Benthem, Johannes Ockeghem Masses and Mass Sections: Masses based on secular
settings. (Utrecht: Koninklijke Vereniging voor Nederlandse Muziekgeschiedenis, 1999): 1-29.

15. Benthem, XII.

16. Ibid.

17. Ibid., X.
 Hayden 6

dei.18 With the exception of the first iteration of the song in the Credo, a freely composed coda

follows each return to A in the ternary pattern.19 In addition, Ockeghem shies away from the use

of long or drawn-out introductions of the various mass sections. That is to say that a part of the

Lhomme arm theme begins at the start of nine out of the total fourteen sections in which any

material of the song at all may be found, while those which begin without the theme present

normally wait fewer than four measures before its entrance.20 Keeping the cantus firmus under an

almost exclusively imperfect tempus with major prolation, Ockeghems only deviations in terms

of the songs mensuration signs are found in the second section of the Gloria in which all of the

voices signs are diminished by a factor of two and in the first section of the Credo where the

tempus of the tune is perfect.21

Also significant to the treatment of the tenor in Ockeghems mass is his changing placement of

the cantus firmus between the second lowest and the lowest sounding voice. In the Kyrie, Gloria,

and Sanctus, the theme is in the tenor as is to be expected, but for the entireties of the Credo and

Agnus dei, the tenor becomes the lowest voice with no alterations in the melody made to

accommodate the change in voicing.22 The overall drop in tessitura which is due in large part to

this reworking of the location of the cantus firmus, is believed by Planchart to signify

18. Ibid., 1-29.

19. Ibid., X.

20. Lockwood, 113.

21. Benthem, 1-29.

22. Ibid.
 Hayden 7

Ockeghems return to his own compositional voice, as opposed to paying homage to Dufay in the

more closed opening which has a higher overall range.23 One may also remark in drawing a

comparison with Dufays mass that differences exist in Ockeghems textures in the absence of

the cantus firmus. His Sanctuscomposed with a single Osanna in opposition to Dufays two

contains two sections in which no part of the cantus firmus is heard; yet when looking at the

score, one notices that Ockeghem is careful to grow the overall texture very gradually so as to

lead the audience towards the inclusion of the theme after the momentary thinning of the

voices.24

When contrasted against Ockeghems use of Lhomme arm in his mass, Dufay constructs a

work of a completely different character. In the most obvious of dissimilarities, the length of this

mass by Dufay renders it as being the longest mass he is known to have composed.25 Of the

many areas of inquiry that have been made into the study of this massthese range from tonal

analyses and discrepancy issues in surviving manuscripts to the use of head motives and strange

polyrhythms among the voicesthe use of the Lhomme arm song as a cantus firmus is of

particular interest to many scholars. This is because unlike in his mass Se la face ay pale where

the rhythmic integrity of the tenor is well-maintained, the tenor in this mass is subject to a great

variety of rhythmic and even ornamental alterations.26 Dufay is even so bold as to add freely

23. Planchart, The Origins and Early History, 332.

24. Benthem, 18-22.

25. Planchart, The Origins and Early History, 328.

26. Planchart, Guillaume Du Fay, Opera Omnia: Missa Lhomme arm. (Santa Barbara: Marisol Press,
2011): 44.
 Hayden 8

composed, supplementary material into the tenor voice at the end of nearly every major section.27

Several musicologists who have analyzed this piece, among whom Planchart makes sure to

mention Craig Wright and his work The Maze and the Warrior,28 find endless symbolism in the

distortions of the tenor in this particular Lhomme arm mass; however, with varying

interpretations and claims being made about the motives behind Dufays musical choices, it is

still unclear as to the tenability of many of these assumptions.29

Because Dufays usage of the tune is quite different in each of the mass sections, I will proceed

in describing each of them separately in their performance order. Starting with the Kyrie, the

original tune is stated only once and is split among the three sections with the first Kyrie

possessing the first A section excluding the last four notes, the Christe laying claim to those

forsaken notes and the entire B section, and the second Kyrie having the second A section which

is therein stated and then repeated once again twice as fast in order to end the movement.30

Manipulation of the tenor in this movement is done very sparingly, as the only deviations from

the original melody occur in the form of freely composed material at the end of the first Kyrie

and a slight descending ornamentation halfway through the statement of the B section in the

Christe.31 With a single scan of the score, one automatically notices the long introductory duets
27. Ibid.

28. Craig Wright, The Maze and the Warrior: Symbols in architecture, theology, and music. (Cambridge:
Harvard University Press, 2001).

29. Planchart, Guillaume Du Fay, 54.

30. Planchart, Guillaume Du Fay, 1-4.

31. Ibid.
 Hayden 9

and trios which are sung before the entrance of the tenor in many parts of the mass. In terms of

the Kyrie, these occur in the second and third sections of the movement.32

Each of the two sections of the Gloria are also started with lengthy, introductory duets, and in

this movement of the mass, the song is heard once in each section.33 Although the statement of

the chanson is present, the cantus firmus is to be sung stretched in length to the point of not

being able to recognize the tune without the score.34 This coupled with the insertions of rests in

haphazard locations, bouts of ornamentation, and even a short imitation of the cantus firmus in

the second tenor in mm. 39-41 all serve to obscure the Lhomme arm melody from the listener.35

Such a technique is also employed in the Credo where reiterations of the tune, on the other hand,

are heard three timesonce in the first section, and twice in the second section wherein the

second of these is sung twice as fast with the previously added longa rests removed.36

Similarities between the Gloria and Credo are striking by way of the cantus firmus; for in

addition to maintaining a nearly identical prolongation of the tune by increases in note durations

taken from the Gloria, whatever ornaments were added to the melody also remain globally intact

in the Credo.37 Differences between the movements are not at all in short supply one notices, as
32. Ibid.

33. Ibid., 5-13.

34. Ibid.

35. Planchart, Guillaume Du Fay, 5-13.

36. Ibid., 14-26.

37. Planchart, The Origins and Early History, 330.

 Hayden 10

the introductory duets of the Credo are remarkably protractedthey are in fact the longest of the

massand the third, most easily recognizable statement of the cantus firmus up to this point is

followed by a rather stately, freely composed coda of a considerable duration which fends off the

recently heard theme from the mind.38

Contained within the five sections of Dufays Sanctus are two statements of the Lhomme arm

theme, one of which is split among the opening section and the first Osanna and the second of

which is to be found in its entirety in the second Osanna.39 Despite there being no signs at all of

the cantus firmus to be found in the three-voice pleni sunt cli, the first presentation of the

cantus firmus is relatively clear in the first and third parts of the movement.40 The opening of the

Sanctus finds the rhythmic integrity kept when one excludes a few elongated notes at the

beginning and ends of the A and B section statements, while the singing of the last A section in

the first Osanna is considerably yet proportionately elongated before an impressively elaborate

ornamentation concludes the first iteration of the Lhomme arm theme of this movement.41 This,

however, is not the only manner in which Dufay toys with the listeners impression of the theme;

for just as the B section of the theme is about to be stated, the second tenor anticipates the first in

a manner so as to make it appear as if the first tenor is imitating the second until the end of part B

of the melody. Such a use of imitation by Dufay becomes the first significant appearance of

38. Planchart, Guillaume Du Fay, 55.

39. Ibid., 27-33.

40. Ibid.

41. Planchart, Guillaume Du Fay, 27-33.

 Hayden 11

Lhomme arm melodic material in a voice other than the first tenor.42 Absence of the cantus

firmus in the Benedictus allows for a stark contrast with the second Osanna, for it is here in this

section that Dufays cantus firmus is stated for the first time in the mass without ornament, given

in its complete form with original rhythms, and not broken up amongst the sections of a

movement.43 This allows for a salient and intelligible hearing of the tune after the singing of such

distortions as were heard in the Credo and of such confounding ornaments which pervaded all

previous presentations of the melody.

Dufays Agnus dei in the mass Lhomme arm is accompanied by a verbal canon which must be

well understood before this section can be accurately performed. Other very direct verbal canons

were used at the ends of the Kyrie and Credo to indicate diminutions as opposed to achieving an

increase in speed by means of mixing mensuration signs.44 However in the final Agnus dei

which comes after a complete and direct restatement of the Lhomme arm song in the first

Agnus dei as was heard in the second Osanna, and an extremely fragmented flirting with parts of

the theme in the trio or second Agnus dei in which the first tenor is tacetthe famous melody is

written out a single time with the following canon added: Cancer eat plenus sed repeat medius.45

This translates to, Let the crab go full but come back in half, signifying that the written melody

is to be sung first backwards with fully indicated values and then a second time forwards and

42. Ibid.

43. Ibid.

44. Ibid., 54.

45. Planchart, Guillaume Du Fay, 34-38.

 Hayden 12

twice as fast.46 Alejandro Plancharts edition of the mass has the tenor in this section transcribed

as it would have appeared had it been written out, allowing for a clear view of the interplay

between the voices that such a canon creates. Sung the first time through in the third Agnus dei,

the tune is completely unintelligible.47 After the doubling of speed and the termination of the

retrograde however, a sense of climax flows from the cantus firmus until the very end of the

mass as the uninhibited theme, only heard before in the second Osanna and first Agnus dei, had

until this point been well obfuscated by the second Agnus dei and the start of the third.48

Planchart believes that this final, dramatic section of the mass reflects Dufays attempt to portray

the death of Christthrough the obliteration of the theme heard in the first half of the third

Agnus dei using retrogradeand his resurrectionin the form of the well-heard Lhomme arm

theme to conclude the mass.49 While this speculation seems quite probable, what is sure is the

efficacy of the musical technique employed regardless of its underlying motive.

Undoubtedly, these masses by Ockeghem and Dufay represent wholly different ways of using the

famous melody in a mass setting. Insofar as it is generally agreed that these two are the earliest

in the Lhomme arm tradition which extends well into the fifteenth century, the implications of

such a claim may give us insight into why the tune became so popular.50 Lockwood proposes that

if this pair of composersboth of whom well-respected during their lives and after their deaths
46. Magro, 13.

47. Planchart, Guillaume Du Fay, 34-38.

48. Ibid.

49. Ibid., 57.

50. Lockwood, 108.

 Hayden 13

were each known by others to have composed a mass based on Lhomme arm, then using this

melody as a cantus firmus might have developed over the ensuing decades into a sort of test of

compositional skill.51 Given that the chanson was relatively famous throughout the fourteenth

century, this hypothesis seems quite plausible, as both Dufays and Ockeghems settings serve as

shining examples of the creative possibilities one may find in cantus firmus masses of the early

Renaissance.

Bibliography

Benthem, Jaap van. Johannes Ockeghem Masses and Mass Sections: Masses based on secular
settings. Utrecht: Koninklijke Vereniging voor Nederlandse Muziekgeschiedenis, 1999.

51. Ibid.
 Hayden 14

Cohen, Judith. The Six Anonymous Lhomme arm Masses in Naples, Biblioteca Nazionale, MS
VI E 40. Middleton: A-R Editions, 1968.

Lockwood, Lewis. Aspects of the 'L'Homme Arm' Tradition. Proceedings of the Royal
Musical Association 100 (1973): 97-122. http://www.jstor.org/stable/766178. (accessed
October 17, 2016).

Magro, Agostino. Varietas et Uniformit dans la Messe L'Homme Arm de Guillaume Dufay.
Musurgia 7, no. 1 (2000): 7-28. http://www.jstor.org/stable/40591193. (accessed October
17, 2016).

Planchart, Alejandro Enrique. Guillaume Du Fay, Opera Omnia: Missa Lhomme arm. Santa
Barbara: Marisol Press, 2011.

______. The Origins and Early History of L'homme arm. Journal of Musicology 20, no. 3
(Summer 2003): 305-357. http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1525/ jm.2003.20.3.305
(accessed October 17, 2016).

Wright, Craig. The Maze and the Warrior: Symbols in architecture, theology, and music.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2001.