... basically irregularly shaped, and the rhythmic technique was emblematic of the six rhythmic modes. They were very simple, rhythmically, and consisted mainly of longs and breves. The unbalanced form of Lays depicts the Lay principle of musical change, and they tend to be through composed, with continually changing line lengths and rhymes. The length of the individual lines is itself stated by the length of the melodic phrase. The Lay tends to be in 6/4 or 6/8 time throughout, incorporating the initiative of internal rhyme or brief lines which come together to form one longer line. Towards the end of the century, Lays became more rhythmically complex. Machaut was ahead of his time as in his Lay "S'onques douleureusement" he incorporates triple time syncopation which, at the time it was written, was a novelty to him, but demonstrated the increasing complexity of the Lay towards the end of the fourteenth century. One ...

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