His known works include thirty-six chansons (literally, "songs"), forty-six
rondets de carole, eighteen
jeux-partis, fourteen
rondeaux, five
motets, one
rondeau-virelai, one
ballette, one ''dit d'amour
, and one congé''. Adam's shorter pieces are accompanied by music, of which a transcript in modern notation, with the original score, is given in
Edmond de Coussemaker's edition. His
Jeu de Robin et Marion is cited as the earliest French play with music on a secular subject. The
pastoral, which tells how Marion resisted the knight, and remained faithful to Robert the shepherd, is based on an old chanson, ''Robin m'aime, Robin m'a
. It consists of dialogue varied by refrains already current in popular song. The melodies to which these are set have the character of folk music, and are more spontaneous and melodious than the more elaborate music of his songs and motets. Fétis considered Le Jeu de Robin et Marion
and Le Jeu de la feuillée
forerunners of the comic opera. An adaptation of Le Jeu Robin et Marion'', by
Julien Tiersot, was played at Arras by a company from the Paris
Opéra-Comique on the occasion of a festival in 1896 in honour of Adam de le Hale. His other play,
Le jeu Adan or
Le jeu de la Feuillee (ca. 1262), is a
satirical drama in which he introduces himself, his father and the citizens of Arras with their peculiarities. His works include a
congé, or satirical farewell to the city of Arras, and an unfinished
chanson de geste in honour of Charles of Anjou,
Le roi de Secile, begun in 1282; another short piece,
Le jeu du pelerin, is sometimes attributed to him.
Editions • article by Paulin Paris in:
Histoire litteraire de La France (vol. xx. pp. 638–675) • The edition of Adam's two jeux in:
Monmerqué and Michel's
Theatre francais au moyen age (1842) •
Oeuvres completes (1872), edited by
E. de Coussemaker. •
Ernest Langlois,
Le jeu de Robin et Marion (1896), with a translation in modern French •
A Guesnon, La Satire a Arras au XIIIe, siecle (1900) •
Canchons et Partures des... Adan delle Hale, a critical edition by Rudolf Berger,(Halle, 1900) • Nigel Wilkins, The Lyric Works of Adam de la Halle, ed., Corpus Musicae, Vol.44,
American Institute of Musicology, 1967. • Recent French ed. of complete works: edited by Pierre-Yves Badel (Paris: Livre de poche, 1995) () ==Recordings==