Gaidifer d'Avion (fl.

Floruit

Floruit , abbreviated fl. , is a Latin verb meaning "flourished", denoting the period of time during which something was active...

 1230–50) was an Artesian

Arras

Arras is the capital of the Pas-de-Calais department in northern France. The historic centre of the Artois region, its local speech is characterized as a Picard dialect...

 trouvère

Trouvère

Trouvère , sometimes spelled trouveur , is the Northern French form of the word trobador . It refers to poet-composers who were roughly contemporary with and influenced by the troubadours but who composed their works in the northern dialects of France...

 from Avion

Avion

Avion may refer to:* Avion, the french name for airplane ; coming from latin "avus" . Same family as "aviation".* Avion * Avion...

. He entered the Church

Roman Catholic Church

The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the world's largest Christian church, with over a billion members. Led by the Pope, it defines its mission as spreading the gospel of Jesus Christ, administering the sacraments and exercising charity...

 and was associated with the poets of the so-called "School of Arras".

Gaidifer was well-connected to contemporary poets. He was a respondent to Jehan Bretel

Jehan Bretel

Jehan Bretel was a trouvère. Of his known oeuvre of probably 97 songs, 96 have survived. Judging by his contacts with other trouvères he was famous and popular...

 in two jeux partis judged by the trouvères Perrin d'Angicourt and Jehan le Cuvelier d'Arras

Jehan le Cuvelier d'Arras

Jehan le Cuvelier d'Arras was a trouvère associated with the so-called "school of Arras". He may be the same person as Johannes Cuvellarius from Bapaume, a suburb of Arras, who is mentioned in documents of 1258. He was the respondent in nine jeux partis and judge of six; he also composed six...

 and the banker Audefroi Louchart. Gaidifer was a judge of Jehan de Grieviler

Jehan de Grieviler

Jehan de Grieviler was an Artesian cleric and trouvère.Jehan was probably born at Grévillers near Arras. A certain "Grieviler" is mentioned in the necrology of the Confrérie des jongleurs et des bourgeois d'Arras under 1254–5, but since Jehan was a known member of the Puy d'Arras, he cannot...

 and Robert de Castel

Robert de Castel

Robert de Castel was a trouvère active in and around Arras in the late thirteenth century. He is mentioned in the Congés of Baude Fastoul, written in 1272, which place him Arras at that date...

 in two other jeux partis.

Besides his two jeux, Gaidifer wrote seven chanson courtoises, six of which appear only in the Rome Chansonnier. His style is described as "sharply circumscribed": all his poems are isometric

Isometre

Isometre is a music theory term describing the use of pulse without regular meter. See also: homorhythm. The music is currently used in the psalmsongs of the Orthodox Reformed Churches in the Netherlands, based on the rhythm made by Petrus Datheen , as well as some other churches....

 and octo-

Octosyllable

The octosyllable or octosyllabic verse is a line of verse with eight syllables. It is equivalent to tetrameter verse in iambs or trochees in languages with a stress accent. It is often used in French, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese poetry...

 or decasyllabic. All his simple melodies are in bar form

Bar form

Bar form is a musical form of the pattern AAB.-Original Use:The term comes from the rigorous terminology of the Meistersinger guilds of the 15th to 18th century who used it to describe their songs and the songs of the predecessors, the minnesingers of the 12th to 14th century...

, but spanning wide ranges (often an octave or higher). In Tant ai d'amours, which served as a model for Lambert Ferri

Lambert Ferri

Lambert Ferri was a trouvère and cleric at the Benedictine monastery at Saint-Léonard, Pas-de-Calais. By 1268 he was a canon and a deacon of the monastery; he is last associated with the monastery in 1282....

 (J'ai tant d'amours apris et entendu) and Adam de la Bassée (Ave rosa rubens et tenera), there is repetition in the cauda

Cauda

The Cauda is a characteristic feature of songs in the Conductus style of a cappella music which flourished between the mid-12th and the mid-13th century. The conductus style placed strict rules on composition, and some such rules were devoted to the cauda, which came at the penultimate syllable of...

. One piece, Tout me samble, does not survive with its music.

List of pieces

• Gaidifer, par courtoisie, with Bretel
• Gaidifer, d'un jeu parti, with Bretel
• Amours qui sur tous a pooir
• Je me cuidoie bien tenir
• Las pour quoi ris ne jus me chant
• Par grant esfort m'estuet dire et chanter
• Quant Dieus ne veut, tout si saint n'ont pooir
• Tant ai d'amours apris et entendu
• Tout me samble noient [quant ne vous v]oi