Richart de Semilli (''

floruit ''Floruit'' ( ; usually abbreviated fl. or occasionally flor.; from Latin for 'flourished') denotes a date or period during which a person was known to have been alive or active. In English, the unabbreviated word may also be used as a noun indic ...

'' late 12th or early 13th century) was a

trouvère ''Trouvère'' (, ), sometimes spelled ''trouveur'' (, ), is the Northern French ('' langue d'oïl'') form of the '' langue d'oc'' (Occitan) word ''trobador'', the precursor of the modern French word '' troubadour''. ''Trouvère'' refers to po ...

, probably from

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

, which he mentions three times in his extant works. These number ten in one ''

chansonnier A chansonnier (, , Galician and , or ''canzoniéro'', ) is a manuscript or printed book which contains a collection of chansons, or polyphonic and monophonic settings of songs, hence literally " song-books"; however, some manuscripts are call ...

'' (with a few also copied into related manuscripts), and one anonymous song, "", which has sometimes been attributed to him by modern scholars, but of which most of the first strophe and music are missing. Unusually for a trouvère, Richart used the same poetic structure and melody for his "" and "", and also for "" and "". Even within his pieces his melodies make heavy use of repetition, another departure from what was typical of the trouvères. "" uses one phrase and a variant, while "" uses three phrases and their variants for eleven lines. This last piece, along with "" and "", each use variations of the last melodic lines three times. All his melodies are simple, with "" being the most ornate. None survive in

mensural notation Mensural notation is the musical notation system used for polyphony, polyphonic European vocal music from the late 13th century until the early 17th century. The term "mensural" refers to the ability of this system to describe precisely measur ...

, but this has not prevented the suggestion that "" is in the second mode. For his other pieces, Richart preferred the authentic D mode and plagal F mode. "" and "" are '' rotrouenges''. Several of Richart's pieces were used as models by other trouvères. "" and "" served as models for an anonymous song about the

Virgin Mary Mary was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Saint Joseph, Joseph and the mother of Jesus. She is an important figure of Christianity, venerated under titles of Mary, mother of Jesus, various titles such as Perpetual virginity ...

, "". "" was a model for the anonymous ""; "" for the anonymous "", another song about Mary; and "" for yet another Marian praise, "". Richart's song "" is similar to two other songs, but whether it was the model (earlier piece) or the ''

contrafactum In vocal music, contrafactum (or contrafact, pl. contrafacta) is "the substitution of one text for another without substantial change to the music". The earliest known examples of this "lyrical adaptation" date back to the 9th century in Gregor ...

'' (later) is not clear. The two other songs are "" by Moniot de Paris, a fellow Parisian, and "" by the Moine de Saint Denis, also a local.

References

* Theodore Karp
"Richart de Semilli."
''Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online''. Accessed 20 September 2008. {{DEFAULTSORT:Semilli, Richart de Trouvères Musicians from Paris French male classical composers