The Lost Voices Project

Companion resource to Les livres de Chansons Nouvelles de Nicolas Du Chemin (1549–1568), hosted by the Centre d’Études Supérieures de la Renaissance in Tours, France

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Le Rat

fl. 1540’s–1550’s

French composer active 1549 to 1557. Total of seven chansons ascribed to Le Rat: four in the Chansons nouvelles series, another pair in the Second livre of 1557, and single one in a book issued by Attaingnant’s widow in 1553. Is the text of D’un amy fainct je ne puis deffaire by François I? Saint-Gelais? Text of J’ay vue que j’estois serviteur appears in Lotrain’s La fleur of 1542-3. The text of O cruaulté logee en grant beaulté is by Marot: Chanson XXIX. Stylistically his works are homorhythymic in the manner of Parisian composers Sandrin, Certon, and Arcadelt. Frank Dobbins, “Le Rat,” New Grove 2, XIV, 575