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Johannes Cesaris (fl. 1406 – 1417) was a French composer of the lateMedieval era and earlyRenaissance. He was one of the composers of the transitional style between the two epochs, and was active at theBurgundian court in the early 15th century.
Little is known about his life, excepting the years he was active inBourges. He was a cleric for theDuke of Berry inBourges in 1406, andmaître des enfants (choirmaster to the boys) at the cathedral there from 1407 to 1409. In 1417 he was probably the organist atAngers cathedral. A Pierre Cesaris, possibly a relative, was active in Bourges until 1443. There is a reference in a contemporary poem,Le champion des dames byMartin le Franc to Johannes Cesaris being a popular composer inParis in the early part of the century (this is the same manuscript that contains the famous portraits ofGuillaume Dufay andGilles Binchois).
Of his works, onemotet, twoballades, and fiverondeaux survive, as well as a sixth rondeau which has a contested attribution (it may be byPasset). Stylistically, they span both the manneristic complexities of thears subtilior, which was the predominant style inAvignon in the 1390s, and the relatively simple song style of the early 15th century as it was developing in the courts of France and Burgundy. His motetA virtutis ignitio/Ergo beata/Benedicta filia, for four voices with three simultaneously sung texts, isisorhythmic in all parts. One of the secular songs, the rondeauA l'aventure va Gauvain, is in a style which suggests the later generation, and may have been written later than 1417; indeed many of his pieces are from manuscripts dated from early to mid-century.
One of his pieces, the balladeLe dieus d'amours, was copied into the famousChantilly Codex, theilluminated manuscript which is the primary source for the Avignon repertory of thears subtilior.
Tapissier is among the musicians mentioned byMartin le Franc in his long poem,Le Champion des dames:[1]
Cesaris seems to have been mostly forgotten before the 20th-century; in 1866, the musicologistFrançois-Joseph Fétis remarked that the names Tapissier, Carmen and Cesaris were unknown to music scholars.[2]
Cesaris's works are included in the following collections:
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