Philippe de Vitry

Philippe de Vitry (1291-1361) was a French composer, music theorist, poet, philosopher and mathematician, and one of the central figures of late medieval music. He is regarded as a leading theorist of the ars nova, the movement that reshaped musical notation and rhythm in the fourteenth century, and as an innovative composer whose reach extended well beyond France.

The details of his life are sketchy. He probably studied at the University of Paris, since he is often referred to with the title magister. He served as secretary and adviser at the courts of Charles IV, Philip VI and John II, which helped him secure several canonries at Clermont, Beauvais and Paris. He also worked as a diplomat and, by the record, was present at the siege of Aiguillon. In 1351 he became Bishop of Meaux. His contemporaries admired him as a scholar and musician, and Petrarch wrote him a warm letter the same year.

His best-known theoretical work is the treatise Ars nova musicae, which gave its name to a whole period. Its authorship is debated, and only part of its text is thought to be his own. The treatise promoted more flexible rhythmic and notational rules, which allowed a polyphony less constrained by the limits of the ars antiqua and paved the way for the ars subtilior. He is also credited, with some uncertainty, with developing isorhythm. Most of his surviving music consists of motets, each built around a highly individual structural idea; almost all of his secular music has been lost. His influence reached Italy: Francesco Landini alluded to him implicitly in his madrigal Si dolce non sono, and the treatise cited his motets as models.