What is Ballade?
:''For the ballade as a musical (instrumental) form see '''[[ballade (musical form)]]'''. '' A '''ballade''' is a [[Middle Ages|medieval]] [[France|French]] [[verse]] or [[song]] which tells a [[story]]. Like the [[rondeau]] and the [[virelai]] it was very popular in [[14th century|14th]] and [[15th century]] France. All these three songs were originally [[dance]]s. Famous [[composer]]s like [[Guillaume de Machaut]] wrote ballades. Ballade verses often had three [[stanza]]s which had the same [[metre]] and [[rhyme scheme]], and the last line was often the same. They might end with an [[envoi]] which meant that it was addressing a [[king]] or [[prince]]. The great [[England|English]] [[poet]] [[Geoffrey Chaucer]] wrote ballades. [[Category:Musical forms]] [[Category:Poetry forms]] {{music-stub}}