Guillaume de Machaut

Guillaume de Machaut was a 14th-century French composer and poet, known as a leading figure of the Ars Nova music style. He was one of the first to integrate music with poetry, creating complex compositions that reflected the emotions of the time. His most famous work, the "Mass of Notre Dame," is one of the earliest complete settings of the Ordinary of the Mass by a single composer. Machaut's influence shaped both music and literature, and he is celebrated for pioneering secular song forms and for his contributions to the development of polyphony in Western music.