, the natural son of the subject of the next article, was born at
, the natural
son of the subject of the next article, was born at Venice in
1532, during his father’s embassy there, and studied under
Ronsard, making particular progress in the Greek tongue.
He devoted himself afterwards to French poetry, which he
disfigured not a little by a mixture of Greek and Latin
words. His object was to give to the French the cadence
and measure of the Greek and Latin poetry, in which he
was very unsuccessful. Cardinal Perron said of him, that
he was a good man, but a bad poet. He set his own verses,
however, to music; not, says Dr. Burney, to such music as
might be expected from a man of letters, or a dilletanti,
consisting of a single melody, but to counterpoint, or music in parts. Of this kind he published, in 1561, “Twelve
hymns or spiritual songs;
” and, in Songs,
” all in four parts, of which both the words and the
music were his own. In all he was allowed to be as good
a musician as a poet; but what mostly entitles him to notice, is his having established a musical academy at Paris,
the first of the kind; but m this he had to encounter many
difficulties. The court was for it, and Charles IX. and
Henry III. frequently attended these concerts; but the
parliament and the university opposed the scheme as likely
to introduce effeminacy and immorality. The civil wars
occasioned their being discontinued, but they were long
after revived, and proved the origin of the divertissements,
the masquerades, and balls, which formed the pleasures of
the court until the time of Louis XIV. Bayf died in 1592.
His poems were published at Paris in 1573, 2 vols. 8vo, and
consist of serious, comic, sacred, and profane pieces; the
first volume is entitled “Euvres en rime,
” the other “Les
Jeux.
” His mode of spelling is as singular as his composition, but the whole are now fallen into oblivion.