La Trobe University - Library: Medieval Music Database - Annual cycle of feasts of liturgical chant, liturgical polyphony and secular music of the late middle ages.

Giunge 'l bel tempo della primavera

canonic madrigal by Jacopo da Bologna

Sources

Florence: Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale, Panciatichiano 26, fol. 93 (2/2).

Facsimiles

Il codice musicale Panciatichi 26 della Biblioteca Nazionale di Firenze, facsimile edition by F. Alberto Gallo, Florence: Leo S. Olschki Editore, 1981, no. 165.

Editions

1. MARROCCO, W. Thomas. Fourteenth-Century Italian Cacce, Cambridge/Massachusetts: The Medieval Academy of America, 1942, p. 44.
2. The Music of Jacopo da Bologna, edited by W. Thomas Marrocco, Berkeley: University of California, 1954. University of California Publications in Music 5, p. 42.
3. The Music of Fourteenth-Century Italy, edited by Nino Pirrotta, Rome: American Institute of Musicology, 1963. Corpus Mensurablis Musicae 8/IV, p. 34.
4. Italian Secular Music by Magister Piero, Giovanni da Firenze and Jacopo da Bologna, edited by W. Thomas Marrocco, Monaco: Editions de L'Oiseau-Lyre, 1967. Polyphonic Music of the Fourteenth Century VI, p. 92.

Text Editions

1. CORSI, Giuseppe. Rimatori del Trecento, Turin: Unione tipografica editrice torinese, 1969, p. 1018.
2. CORSI, Giuseppe. Poesie musicali del Trecento, Bologna: Commissione per i testi di lingua, 1970, p. 34.

Literature

1. MARTINEZ, Marie L. Die Musik des frühen Trecento, Tutzing: Hans Schneider, 1963. Münchener Veröffentlichungen zur Musikgeschichte 9.
2. TOGUCHI, K. 'Sulla struttura e l'esecuzione di alcune cacce italiane. Un cenno sulle origini delle cacce arsnovistiche', L'Ars nova italiana del Trecento III: Certaldo 1969, 1970, p. 69.

Recordings

Two Gentlemen of Verona, Ensemble of the Fourteenth Century, directed by John Griffiths and John Stinson (1987): Move MC 3091.

Text

Giunge 'l bel tempo de la primavera,
che nov'erbette dà, fior e viole;
cresce beato amor dov'esser vuole.

A' dolci versi d'uselletti fuora
van donne pe' ghirland'in compagnia,
seguendo lor amor drei tuttavia.

Ed ogni frutto del piacer germoglia,
ché sol consiglio fan d'amar di voglia

Translation

The lovely springtime has arrived,
sprouting fresh grass, flowers and violets;
love burgeons to prosper wherever it wishes.

Outdoors, amid sweet birdsong,
a company of women sallies forth for garlands,
pursuing their loves just the same.

And every fruit of pleasure bursts in bud,
because their sole counsel is to love willingly.
Text revision and translation © Giovanni Carsaniga