Composers of the High Renaissance Era

This companion to Part Two: The Renaissance Era is an encyclopedia of composers of the High Renaissance in chronological order. The playlist below is a selection of pieces by some of the composers covered in this reference guide. The numbers that appear before the names of compositions in the text below refer to their position in the playlist. There are also separate playlists for each composer which contain all of the recordings available on Spotify barring those that are arrangements for modern instruments, instrumental arrangements of pieces originally scored for voices and the like.

Composers of the High Renaissance (1470–1530)

Heinrich Isaac (b. Brabant or Flanders, c. 1450–55; d. Florence, March 26, 1517) was a leading composer of the late 15th and early 16th centuries, recognized alongside Josquin des Prez and Jacob Obrecht as a central figure of the Franco-Flemish school.

Isaac’s early career included work as an organist and composer in Florence, where he was closely associated with Lorenzo de’ Medici and served at the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore. He set several of Lorenzo’s carnival songs and was a prominent member of the city’s musical life from about 1484 to 1492. Isaac left Florence during the Medici exile and entered the service of Emperor Maximilian I around 1494, becoming court composer in 1497-a position of great prestige. He traveled widely between Florence, Vienna, Innsbruck, and other courts, and was a candidate for the post of kapellmeister in Ferrara in 1503, though the position ultimately went to Josquin des Prez. Isaac returned to Florence in his final years, remaining active until his death.

Isaac was one of the most prolific composers of his era, with an output spanning nearly every contemporary genre. He composed at least 36 surviving mass cycles and 13 independent Credo settings, making him one of the most productive mass composers of the Renaissance. About half of his masses are based on borrowed melodies-both sacred and secular-such as Franco-Flemish chansons, Dutch and German popular songs, and plainchant. The other half are based on plainsong and were often intended for alternatim performance, reflecting his deep engagement with liturgical traditions. Notable masses include Missa ‘Virgo prudentissima’, Missa ‘La Spagna’, Missa carminum (incorporating German popular songs), and Missa ‘Comme femme’ (based on a chanson by Binchois). Isaac’s masses are celebrated for their technical mastery, inventive use of cantus firmus, canon, paraphrase, ostinato, and modal unity. He skillfully balanced dense polyphony with clear textures and often integrated borrowed material in innovative ways, migrating the cantus firmus between voices and employing both imitative and chordal writing.

Isaac’s reputation rests not only on his masses but also on his motets, secular songs, and instrumental works. He wrote more than 50 motets, ranging from grand ceremonial pieces-such as the six-voice Virgo prudentissima and Angeli Archangeli-to more intimate settings. His best-known secular work is the song Innsbruck, ich muss dich lassen, which became the basis for later Lutheran and classical adaptations, though the melody itself may not be original to Isaac. He composed songs in French, Italian, German, and Latin, and left nearly 100 secular and instrumental pieces, making his instrumental output one of the largest of the early period.

Isaac’s most monumental achievement is the Choralis Constantinus, a vast collection of over 375 Gregorian chant-based polyphonic motets for the Proper of the Mass, commissioned by the Cathedral of Konstanz in 1508. This was the first comprehensive polyphonic setting of the Mass Propers for the entire liturgical year. After Isaac’s death, his pupil Ludwig Senfl completed and organized the collection, which was published posthumously in three volumes (1550–1555). The Choralis Constantinus had a lasting influence on liturgical music, especially in German-speaking regions, and remains a landmark of Renaissance polyphony.

Isaac’s music was widely disseminated and admired for its motivic development, expressive range, and the ability to bridge regional styles. His works circulated broadly in manuscript and print, influencing generations of composers and securing his reputation as a model of Renaissance composition.

References:
– Reinhard Strohm and Emma Kempson, “Heinrich Isaac,” Grove Music Online
– “Heinrich Isaac,” Wikipedia
– “Heinrich Isaac,” Encyclopaedia Britannica
– “Heinrich Isaac,” Koorklank

1. Motet: Optime Divion date munere pastor ovili à 6 v
2. Lied: O Welt, ich muß dich lassen
3. Virgo prudentissima
4. Innsbruck, ich muss dich lassen

Josquin des Prez (c. 1450–1521) stands as the most influential composer of the High Renaissance, celebrated for his technical mastery, expressive depth, and foundational role in shaping Western art music. Born in the region of Hainaut (now Belgium or northern France), Josquin’s early musical education likely took place in Cambrai or St. Quentin. His first documented professional post was as a singer in the chapel of René of Anjou in 1477, after which he served in the Sforza court in Milan, sang in the papal chapel in Rome (where his name is carved in the Sistine Chapel), and later held positions at the French royal court and at the court of Duke Ercole I d’Este in Ferrara. He spent his final years as provost at the collegiate church of Notre Dame in Condé-sur-l’Escaut.

Josquin’s oeuvre is remarkable for its breadth, innovation, and enduring influence. He composed at least 18 complete masses, over 60 motets, and more than 70 secular works, including chansons and frottole. His music is almost exclusively vocal, and he excelled in every major genre of his day. The pioneering edition of his complete works by Albert Smijers, organized by genre, remains a key resource for performers and scholars.

Josquin’s masses are central to his legacy and demonstrate a wide array of compositional techniques. His cantus firmus masses, such as the two Missa L’homme armé settings (super voces musicales and sexti toni), use popular melodies as structural foundations and explore them through all hexachordal transpositions or innovative canonic devices. The Missa Hercules dux Ferrariae is renowned for its use of a solmization cipher spelling out the Duke’s name, while Missa Pange lingua is a late paraphrase mass in which the hymn permeates every voice, exemplifying Josquin’s mature style of motivic unity and textural clarity. Other notable masses include Missa La sol fa re mi, Missa Fortuna desperata (a parody mass), and Missa de Beata Virgine, a favorite in the 16th century.

Josquin’s motets are widely regarded as the pinnacle of Renaissance polyphony. Early works like Ave Maria … virgo serena display transparent counterpoint, motivic imitation, and careful attention to text structure. Later motets, such as Miserere mei, Deus (inspired by Savonarola), employ austere, declamatory settings and striking repetition for dramatic effect. Other masterpieces include Stabat mater, Praeter rerum seriem, Inviolata, integra et casta es Maria, and Pater noster/Ave Maria, each demonstrating Josquin’s ability to blend expressive word-painting, canonic complexity, and rhetorical clarity. His motets range from Marian antiphons and psalm settings to commemorative laments and large-scale polytextual works.

Josquin’s secular output includes chansons in both the traditional formes fixes and more freely composed, motivically unified styles. Early chansons, influenced by Ockeghem and Busnoys, use intricate counterpoint and popular melodies, while later works like Mille regretz, Faulte d’argent, and Plus nulz regretz are celebrated for their expressive clarity and directness. Josquin also wrote frottole and experimented with hybrid forms such as the motet-chanson and purely instrumental pieces like La Bernardina. His secular music was widely disseminated in print and manuscript, influencing composers across Europe.

Josquin’s music is characterized by motivic development, pervasive imitation, and a new focus on text expression and clarity. He pioneered the use of short, easily recognizable melodic cells that pass between voices, creating unity and variety. His alternation between imitative polyphony and homophonic textures, and his sensitive word-painting, set new standards for Renaissance composition. Musicologists credit Josquin with bridging the styles of Du Fay and Ockeghem with those of Willaert, Arcadelt, Palestrina, and Lassus.

Josquin’s reputation was immense during his life and soared after his death. Ottaviano Petrucci published three volumes of his masses, the first single-composer music books ever printed. Martin Luther praised him as “the master of the notes, which must do as he wishes, while other composers must do as the notes wish.” His music became a model for generations, and many works were attributed to him posthumously to capitalize on his fame. Modern scholarship continues to refine our understanding of his life, works, and influence, but Josquin remains a central figure in the history of Renaissance music.

References:
– Patrick Macey, Jeremy Noble, Jeffrey Dean, and Gustave Reese, “Josquin (Lebloitte dit) des Prez,” Grove Music Online
– “List of compositions by Josquin des Prez,” Wikipedia
– “Josquin des Prez,” Wikipedia
– “Exploring the Legacy of Josquin des Prez: Renaissance Maestro,” The Musical Heritage Society
– Willem Elders, Josquin des Prez and His Musical Legacy: An Introductory Guide

5. Fortuna desperata: Agnus Dei
6. Missa l’homme armé sexti toni: V. Agnus Dei
7. Missa Mater Patris, NJE 10.1: IV. Sanctus
8. Missa Hercules Dux Ferrariae: VII. Inviolata, integra, et casta es Maria
9. Inviolata, integra et casta es
10. Qui habitat in adiutorio altissimi à 24
11. Christus mortuus est
12. Misericordias Domini
13. Nymphes des bois
14. Parfons regretz
15. Plaine de dueil
16. Proch dolor
17. Regretz sans fin
18. Sit nomen domini
19. Recordare virgo mater: I. Prima pars (attribution uncertain)
20. Recordare virgo mater: II. Secunda pars (attribution uncertain)

Robert de Févin (fl. 1500–1515) was a French composer of the early 16th century, active during the High Renaissance and a member of the distinguished Févin family of musicians. He is generally identified as the brother of Antoine de Févin, as indicated by references such as “decori fratres de Févin” in Pierre Moulu’s motet Mater floreat and contemporary accounts. The family’s origins were in Arras, though Robert may have been born in Cambrai or Arras; their father was an alderman in Arras in 1474.

Robert de Févin served as maître de chapelle to the dukes of Savoy, likely at Cambrai or possibly Chambéry, during the first decades of the 16th century. His death is suggested by the ascription “Robertus de fevin pie memorie” above his mass La sol mi fa re in a Munich manuscript, pointing to a date before about 1518.

Févin’s surviving oeuvre is small but notable. It includes three masses (La sol mi fa re, Le vilain jaloux, and one other), a four-voice Credo (the rest of the mass is lost), two settings of the Lamentations of Jeremiah, a five-voice Marian antiphon (Alma Redemptoris mater), and the music for a six-voice motet (text lost). Some of his works appear in the Medici Codex of 1518. His style is closely aligned with that of Josquin des Prez, marked by clarity of texture, careful imitation, and refined polyphonic writing. Two of his masses are directly modeled on works by Josquin, and his Credo La belle se siet demonstrates knowledge of Josquin’s three-voice setting of the same melody. Several of Robert’s works have been misattributed to his brother Antoine due to their stylistic similarities.

All securely attributed sources of Robert de Févin’s music date from the first quarter of the 16th century. His music is praised for its accomplished counterpoint and its place within the mainstream of High Renaissance polyphony, showing the influence of Josquin while maintaining a distinct voice.

References:
– David Fallows, “Févin, Robert de,” Grove Music Online
– “Robert de Févin,” Wikipedia

Pierre de la Rue (b. Tournai?, c. 1452 or later; d. Kortrijk, Nov 20, 1518) was one of the foremost Franco-Flemish composers of the late 15th and early 16th centuries, whose prolific and varied oeuvre spanned all major vocal genres of his time. Likely born in Tournai to Jehan de la Rue and Gertrud de la Haye, he may have received his early musical education at the cathedral’s maîtrise. His early career included positions as a tenor in Brussels, Ghent, and Nieuwpoort, and possibly service in Cambrai and Cologne. By 1492, La Rue had joined the Habsburg-Burgundian chapel, where he served Maximilian I, Philip the Handsome, Margaret of Austria, and Charles V, remaining in imperial service for over two decades.

La Rue’s career was marked by extensive travel with the Habsburg court, including two significant journeys to Spain and a period in England following a shipwreck in 1506. He retired to Kortrijk in 1516 and died there two years later, leaving an estate that attests to his considerable wealth and status.

La Rue’s music circulated widely in his lifetime, preserved in the lavish manuscripts of the Burgundian scriptorium and disseminated through early printed editions by Petrucci and others. He is the best-represented composer in these sources, which include several manuscripts devoted exclusively to his works. Despite this, the chronology of his compositions is difficult to establish, as few works can be precisely dated.

As a mass composer, La Rue was among the most prolific of his generation, with at least 29 masses attributed to him in court manuscripts and by modern scholarship. He favored chant and his own previous works as models, rather than secular tunes, and was a pioneer in the use of paraphrase and parody (imitation) mass techniques. Notably, he wrote two fully canonic masses (Missa O salutaris hostia and Missa Ave sanctissima Maria) and several others with extensive canonic passages. His masses are distinguished by equal-voice writing, paired voice contrasts, and a wide variety of textures, from dense imitation to clear homophony. He was also among the first to expand vocal forces beyond four parts, writing for five or six voices and exploring extremely low bass ranges.

La Rue’s motets, though fewer than his masses, are complex and contrapuntally rich, often centered on Marian themes and canonic devices. More than half use pre-existing material, including chant and borrowings from Ockeghem, Du Fay, and Binchois. He also composed a complete set of Magnificat settings on every tone-the earliest such cycle known-and one of the earliest surviving polyphonic Requiems, likely composed for the funeral of Philip the Handsome.

His secular chansons, mostly for four or five voices, are generally more forward-looking than those of Agricola or Compère, with only a few adhering to the formes fixes. He rarely used borrowed material in his chansons, but did rework models by Ockeghem and composed motet-chansons such as Plorer, gemir, crier/Requiem in commemoration of Ockeghem. His secular music displays the same contrapuntal mastery and motivic unity as his sacred works, though with less interest in homophony and only occasional use of canon.

La Rue’s style is marked by a preference for low voice ranges (sometimes descending to low C or B-flat), frequent use of chromaticism and dissonance, and the breaking up of dense textures with contrasting duets. His music is often compared to that of Josquin des Prez, and misattributions between their works were common. While sometimes considered less focused on textual meaning, some of his works show clear rhetorical power and word-painting.

La Rue’s influence was substantial, with his music serving as models for contemporaries and successors such as Gombert, Richafort, and Manchicourt. He expanded the sound-world of his time through his use of signed accidentals, low ranges, and distinctive harmonic language. His legacy rests on the quantity, variety, and quality of his compositions, as well as his pioneering work in the canonic, parody, and paraphrase mass genres. Today, he is recognized as a master of High Renaissance polyphony, whose inventive and expressive music stands alongside that of Josquin and Isaac.

References:
– Honey Meconi, “La Rue, Pierre de,” Grove Music Online
– “Pierre de la Rue,” Wikipedia
– “Pierre de La Rue,” Encyclopaedia Britannica
– “Pierre de la Rue – A discography,” Medieval Music & Arts Foundation
– “Pierre De la Rue,” Koorklank
– “The 500th Anniversary of Pierre de la Rue’s Death,” RISM
– “Pierre de La Rue (1452-1518),” Naxos Records
– “Pierre de la Rue and Music at the Habsburg-Burgundian Court,” Alamire Foundation

21. O Salutaris hostia
22. Saillies avant (Tant esjoïst mon cuer)

Johannes Ghiselin (fl. 1491–1507), also known as Verbonnet, was a prominent South Netherlandish composer of the High Renaissance, recognized for his technical mastery, innovative mass settings, and connections with major European courts.

Ghiselin’s early career likely included ties to the Burgundian ducal chapel in the 1470s, as he composed the devise of Charles the Bold. By 1491, he was active at the Ferrarese court, petitioning Duke Ercole I d’Este for a prebend for his son and assisting Isabella d’Este in recruiting singers for the chapel. He worked as a singer in Florence in 1492–93 and composed Le cueur la syuit for Margaret of Austria’s departure from Paris in 1494. By 1501, Ghiselin was serving as a singer to the King of France, but he maintained strong ties to Ferrara, forwarding Josquin’s compositions to the Este court and accompanying Josquin to Ferrara in 1503, where he worked alongside Josquin and Obrecht.

Ghiselin’s reputation among his contemporaries was considerable. He was ranked second among Ockeghem’s pupils in Crétin’s 1497 Déploration on Ockeghem’s death, and his music was highly esteemed by theorists and musicians, including Ornithoparchus, Heyden, Glarean, and Wilfflingseder. In 1503, Ottaviano Petrucci published a volume of Ghiselin’s masses, only the second such collection devoted to a single composer after Josquin, underscoring his stature in the musical world of his time.

Ghiselin’s surviving works include masses, motets, chansons, secular songs in Dutch, and some instrumental music. His masses are notable for their structural precision and technical ingenuity, often based on chansons by composers such as Busnois, Agricola, Dufay, Compère, and himself. Works such as the hexachord mass De les armes and the Missa Gratieuse (which employs all available mensuration signs) exemplify his intellectual approach to composition, always in service of formal clarity. His setting of La Spagna for four voices is among the earliest multi-part settings of this famous bassadanza tune.

After the death of Ercole I in 1505 and a plague outbreak, Ghiselin returned to the Netherlands, where he is last recorded in Bergen op Zoom in 1507. His music, admired for both its technical skill and expressive power, reflects the late 15th-century preoccupation with large-scale formal solutions and aligns him with leading contemporaries such as Josquin and Obrecht. Ghiselin’s works continued to be cited as models by later generations, and his influence is evident in the development of the mass and motet in the early 16th century.

References:
– Clytus Gottwald, “Ghiselin [Verbonnet], Johannes,” Grove Music Online
– “Johannes Ghiselin (Verbonnet),” The Kennedy Center
– “Johannes Ghiselin,” Wikipedia

Jacob Obrecht (b Ghent, 1457/8; d Ferrara, shortly before Aug 1, 1505) was a South Netherlandish composer who stands as one of the most innovative and prolific composers of the late 15th century, renowned especially for his masses, motets, and songs. His reputation in the 1480s and 1490s rested on his mastery of the cyclic mass, of which nearly three dozen survive, and his works continued to circulate widely well into the 16th century.

His career was marked by frequent moves and a restless pursuit of positions, serving as choirmaster at Bergen op Zoom (1480–84), master of the choirboys at Cambrai Cathedral (1484–85), and succentor at St Donatian in Bruges (1485–91, 1498–1500), with further appointments in Antwerp and two extended visits to Ferrara, where he was appointed maestro di cappella to Duke Ercole d’Este in 1504. Despite artistic acclaim, his career was troubled by professional instability and episodes of neglect of duty.

Obrecht’s compositional output is remarkable for both its quantity and its stylistic breadth. His early masses, such as Missa Petrus apostolus and De Sancto Donatiano, reveal a profound engagement with the music of his predecessors, notably Antoine Busnoys and Johannes Ockeghem. These works often pay explicit homage through imitation and quotation, yet already display Obrecht’s penchant for structural experimentation and contrapuntal ingenuity.

The central turning point in Obrecht’s career came around 1490, with the advent of his mature style. In masses like Fortuna desperata, Rose playsante, Malheur me bat, and Libenter gloriabor, he fundamentally reconceived the parameters of mass composition. Abandoning the earlier “wall of sound” aesthetic, Obrecht developed a new approach centered on formal design, motivic development, and the purposeful manipulation of texture and cadence. His mature works are characterized by:

• Ingenious treatment of the cantus firmus, often employing techniques such as segmentation, mensural transformation, augmentation, inversion, and retrograde.
• Articulation of musical discourse in self-contained phrase units, frequently linked through literal repetition and motivic sequence.
• Heightened sensitivity to tonal relationships and large-scale formal coherence.
• Leaner, more transparent textures compared to earlier generations, with sharply differentiated lines and a focus on intelligible compositional logic.
• Cadences and structural points of arrival given extraordinary emphasis, often with extended codas or climactic passages.

Obrecht’s mature style invited listeners to “understand” the music, foregrounding the composer’s creative voice and the logic of the musical work as an object-a significant step in the evolution of Renaissance musical aesthetics.

His motets and songs are equally diverse and context-sensitive. Obrecht’s motets, such as Inter preclarissimas virtutes, Laudemus nunc Dominum, and Quis numerare queat, reflect a range of functions, from liturgical to ceremonial to rhetorical. In his later years, Obrecht’s motets became a laboratory for stylistic innovation, with works like Laudes Christo redemptori foreshadowing 16th-century techniques of pervading imitation and a voce piena texture. His secular songs, often in Middle Dutch, range from lively pieces for urban entertainment to more serious works associated with the chambers of rhetoric.

Obrecht’s legacy has been subject to shifting scholarly perspectives. Once viewed primarily as a technical formalist, recent research and revived performances have highlighted the expressive power, melodic inventiveness, and sonorous imagination of his music. His mature masses, in particular, are now recognized as a major influence on Josquin des Prez-indeed, the conception of Josquin’s Missa Hercules dux Ferrarie would have been inconceivable without Obrecht’s precedent. While Obrecht drew on the techniques of Busnoys and Ockeghem, his own innovations did much to elevate the status of the composer’s voice in 15th-century music.

References:
– Rob C. Wegman, “Obrecht, Jacob,” Grove Music Online
– “Jacob Obrecht,” Wikipedia
– Timothy Dickey, “Jacob Obrecht Biography,” AllMusic

23. Missa Pfauenschwanz: Et resurrexit
24. Missa De tous bien plaine: Kyrie

Jean Mouton (b. Samer, before 1459; d. St Quentin, October 30, 1522) was a leading French composer of the early 16th century, celebrated for his mastery of motet writing and his important role at the French royal court.

Mouton’s early career included posts as a singer and teacher at the collegiate church of Notre Dame in Nesle from 1477, where he became maître de chapelle and was ordained a priest by 1483. He later worked at St Omer and Amiens, and in 1501 took charge of music at St André in Grenoble. By the early 1500s, he entered the service of Queen Anne of Brittany, and after her death in 1514, he served in the musical establishment of Louis XII and then François I. Mouton composed music for major royal and state occasions, including births, funerals, coronations, and diplomatic events. He was highly favored at court and by Pope Leo X, who named him apostolic notary. In his later years, Mouton was granted a benefice at St Quentin, where he was likely elected a canon and where he was buried. He was also the teacher of Adrian Willaert, thus influencing the next generation of Franco-Flemish composers.

Mouton’s surviving works include about 100 motets, 9 Magnificat settings, 15 masses, and 25 chansons. His music was widely published and circulated during his lifetime and for decades after his death, with Petrucci dedicating a volume to his masses in 1515 and a posthumous motet collection appearing in 1555. His motets were particularly admired, though attribution issues are common in the sources. Mouton’s style is distinguished by smooth, flowing polyphony, a stately and regular pace, clear melodic motifs, and a preference for full, active textures that remain transparent and balanced. He often used canonic and imitative techniques, but with a personality distinct from Josquin des Prez, favoring placid and technically finished writing over dramatic contrasts. His music sometimes shows a greater awareness of harmonic effects, especially after exposure to Italian styles.

Mouton’s sacred works include settings for liturgical occasions-sequences, responsories, antiphons, psalms, and biblical texts-as well as motets for political or ceremonial events. His contrapuntal skill is evident in works like Nesciens mater Virgo virum, a quadruple canon, and in his use of scaffolding techniques, paraphrase, and parody in his masses. His chansons range from canonic and popular arrangements to complex, motet-like pieces. Mouton’s influence was substantial, both through his own music and through his teaching, and he is recognized as a central figure in the development of the High Renaissance style in France.

References:
– Howard Mayer Brown, revised by Thomas G. MacCracken and Paul L. Ranzini, “Mouton, Jean,” Grove Music Online
– “Jean Mouton,” Wikipedia
– “Jean Mouton,” The Kennedy Center

25. Tota pulchra es

Antoine Brumel (b. c. 1460; d. ?1512–13) was a highly influential French composer, prominent among the generation that followed Josquin des Prez and helped shape the musical language of the High Renaissance.

Brumel was likely born at Brunelles, near Nogent-le-Rotrou, west of Chartres. The earliest record of his career places him as a singer at Notre Dame, Chartres in 1483, and he went on to hold significant posts in Geneva, Paris, and at the court of Savoy. In 1506, Brumel became maestro di cappella at the Este court in Ferrara, a major musical center, where he remained until the chapel’s dissolution in 1510. His last known position was as archpriest near Faenza in 1512, and he likely died soon after.

Brumel’s reputation was widespread in his own time and after, praised by writers such as Crétin, Gaffurius, Glarean, and Zarlino. He is notable as one of the first great Renaissance composers of French rather than Netherlandish origin, and his music circulated widely in both manuscript and print. Ottaviano Petrucci published a volume of his masses, and his works were frequently cited by theorists.

Brumel’s compositional style reflects the profound changes in musical practice around 1500. His early masses, such as Missa ‘Berzerette savoyenne’, Missa ‘Je nay dueul’, Missa ‘L’homme armé’, Missa ‘Ut re mi fa sol la’, and Missa ‘Victimae paschali’, are primarily based on the cantus firmus technique, with some works showing early use of parody. These masses are characterized by irregular rhythms, overlapping phrases, and a relative independence from the text. His middle-period works, including Missa ‘Descendi in hortum’, Missa dominicalis, and especially the twelve-voice Missa Et ecce terrae motus (“Earthquake Mass”), show greater rhythmic regularity, thinner textures, clearer harmonic progressions, and more attention to text setting. The Missa Et ecce terrae motus is particularly celebrated for its massive scale and innovative use of twelve voices, foreshadowing later polychoral techniques and creating monumental harmonic pillars through overlapping triadic motifs.

Brumel’s later masses, such as the Missa pro defunctis (one of the earliest polyphonic Requiems to include the Dies irae), Missa ‘A l’ombre d’ung buissonet’ (constructed entirely from canons), and Missa de beata virgine, display a trend toward concentration, brevity, and learned contrapuntal techniques. The Missa de beata virgine was especially admired by Glarean, who compared it to Josquin’s mass of the same name.

Among Brumel’s most remarkable motets is Nato canunt omnia, a five-voice polytextual Christmas work that stands as one of the most striking achievements of the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries. The main structural text is a rhymed Sequence for Christmas Mass, but Brumel’s setting does not use the associated chant. Instead, the motet is filled with high spirits and inventive textures, quoting the same triple-meter Christmas melody (“Magnum nomen domini Emanuel”) found in Johannes Regis’s O admirabile commercium. Brumel’s work is notable for its lively cross-relations, stacked fifths at the opening of the second part (“Puer natus est”), and exuberant repetitions, all contributing to a festive, jubilant atmosphere that distinguishes it within the genre.

Brumel also composed over thirty motets in a variety of styles, ranging from bitextual works to Marian antiphons and settings of liturgical texts, often employing paraphrase and imitation. His motets and Magnificat settings show both traditional and innovative approaches, including the use of plainchant paraphrase and, in some cases, simultaneous use of all eight modes. His secular output is smaller, including chansons and a few instrumental works, with later pieces often reflecting popular styles and clear, chordal textures.

Brumel’s music bridges the late 15th-century Franco-Flemish tradition and the new Renaissance idiom, helping to define the High Renaissance style through his mastery of mass composition, contrapuntal ingenuity, and harmonic daring.

References:
– Barton Hudson, “Brumel, Antoine,” Grove Music Online
– “Antoine Brumel,” Wikipedia
– “Antoine Brumel,” Brepols Online

26. Missa Et ecce terrai motus: I. Kyrie
27. Missa Et ecce terrai motus: II. Gloria
28. Missa Et ecce terrai motus: III. Gloria
29. Missa Et ecce terrai motus: Va. Agnus Dei I
30. Missa Et ecce terrai motus: Va. Agnus Dei II
31. Nato canunt omnia

Johannes Prioris (c. 1460 – c. 1514) was a Franco-Flemish composer of the Renaissance, recognized as one of the first to compose a polyphonic setting of the Requiem Mass.

Recent scholarship has clarified that “Johannes Prioris” is likely the Latinized form of Denis Prieur (Dionysius Prioris), a canon of Saint-Sauveur in Blois, whose career was rooted in the Loire Valley. The name “Johannes” appears in only a single source, and most contemporary records refer to him as Denis Prieur or Dionysius Prioris. He may have been born in Brabant, but his professional life centered on France, particularly at the French royal court.

Prioris is documented as maître de chapelle (chapelmaster) to King Louis XII of France, a position he held by at least the early 1500s. He is twice referred to as chapelmaster in contemporary sources: once in a letter from Ferrara and once by the chronicler Jean d’Auton. He likely died before 1515, as a new chapelmaster was appointed for the funeral ceremonies of King Louis XII.

His surviving works include at least six masses (five extant), most notably a polyphonic Requiem Mass that may have been composed for the funeral of Anne of Brittany in 1514. Prioris also wrote settings of the Magnificat, numerous motets, and chansons. He contributed to the early 16th-century genre of the motet-chanson, which blends elements of both forms. His chansons often reflect the style of earlier Franco-Flemish masters such as Antoine Busnois and Hayne van Ghizeghem, while his mass and motet writing shows a tendency toward chordal textures and Italian influence, moving away from the dense counterpoint of the previous generation.

Prioris’s music circulated widely, with manuscripts found in both French and Italian sources, including several in the Vatican archives. His style bridges the late Burgundian tradition and the emerging Renaissance idiom, and his innovative approach to the Requiem Mass influenced later composers.

References:
– Louise Litterick, “Johannes Prioris,” Grove Music Online
– Theodor Dumitrescu, “Who Was ‘Prioris’? A Royal Composer Recovered,” Journal of the American Musicological Society
– “Johannes Prioris,” Wikipedia

Marbrianus de Orto (real name Dujardin; b. Tournai, c. 1460; d. Nivelles, Jan or Feb 1529) was a prominent Franco-Flemish composer and singer whose career spanned the late 15th and early 16th centuries. The illegitimate son of a priest, de Orto used the Latinized form of his surname throughout his life. He was probably born and trained in Tournai, in present-day Belgium.

De Orto’s earliest documented position was in the household of Cardinal Ferry de Cluny, Bishop of Tournai, with whom he traveled to Rome in 1482. After the cardinal’s death, he joined the papal choir, serving as a singer in the Sistine Chapel under Popes Sixtus IV, Innocent VIII, and Alexander VI until at least 1499. He was particularly favored by Innocent VIII, who awarded him benefices and removed the impediment of his illegitimacy. During his Roman years, de Orto worked closely with Josquin des Prez, with whom he collaborated and sometimes competed for positions and benefices, especially in Cambrai.

While still in the papal chapel, de Orto became dean of Ste Gertrude in Nivelles, a post he held from the early 1490s and maintained a lifelong connection to the institution, making significant contributions including a bronze reliquary coffer. In 1504–05, he joined the Habsburg-Burgundian chapel of Philip the Fair, rising to premier chapelain and traveling with the court to Spain in 1506. After Philip’s death, de Orto remained briefly in Spain, then returned to the Low Countries, where he continued in the service of Charles V and held canonries at Antwerp’s Church of Our Lady and Ste Gudule in Brussels. By 1518, records list him as “first chaplain” in the Flemish chapel of Charles V. He died in Nivelles in 1529, likely of plague, and was buried at Ste Gertrude, where his tomb remained visible until the church’s destruction in 1940.

De Orto was a moderately prolific composer, with a surviving output that includes masses, motets, lamentations, and chansons. He was among the first composers to write a completely canonic setting of the Ordinary of the Mass (Missa ad fugam), possibly in response to Josquin’s similarly titled work. Five of his masses were published by Ottaviano Petrucci in 1505, making him one of the earliest composers to have a dedicated printed collection. All are cantus-firmus masses, showing a range of techniques from strict paraphrase to freer ostinato and imitative methods. His Missa ‘L’homme armé’ employs the famous tune in multiple mensurations and transpositions, while the Missa ‘J’ay pris amours’ anticipates the parody mass technique.

De Orto’s motets also often use cantus firmus, with the five-part Salve regis mater sanctissima likely composed for the accession of Alexander VI. He may have collaborated with Josquin on revisions of Dufay’s hymn cycle. His chansons range from pieces with Burgundian formes fixes traits to more modern, imitative settings characteristic of the early 16th-century chanson. His expressive setting of Dido’s lament, Dulces exuviae (from Virgil’s Aeneid), is notable for its chromaticism and dissonance, exemplifying the musical humanism of the Renaissance.

De Orto’s influence extended through his service in major European chapels, his association with Josquin, and his possible role as teacher to Arnold von Bruck. His music was widely disseminated in both manuscript and print, securing his place among the most respected composers of his generation.

References:
– Martin Picker, “Marbrianus de Orto,” Grove Music Online
– “Marbrianus de Orto,” Wikipedia
– “Marbrianus de Orto,” Last.fm

Marchetto Cara (c. 1465 – 1525) was an Italian composer, singer, and lutenist, recognized as one of the leading exponents of the frottola and a central figure in the musical life of the Mantuan court during the early 16th century.

Cara was born in Verona, the son of Antonio and Domenica Cara. He trained as a cleric, likely at the Scuola degli Accoliti in Verona, but by 1494 was already in the service of the Gonzaga family in Mantua. Over the next three decades, he became the court’s most prominent musician, serving as personal composer, singer, and lutenist to Marquis Francesco Gonzaga and, after 1511, as maestro di cappella for both sacred and secular music. He was highly esteemed by both Francesco and Isabella d’Este, amassing considerable wealth and property, and was frequently called upon to perform for distinguished guests throughout northern Italy, including members of the Medici family and other courts.

Cara’s reputation as a performer was matched by his renown as a composer. He was frequently commissioned to set the poetry of leading Italian writers and courtiers, and his works were widely disseminated and admired both during his lifetime and posthumously. He died in Mantua in late 1525.

Cara’s œuvre consists primarily of more than 100 frottole, along with a small number of sacred works, including a three-voice Salve regina and several laude. The frottola was the principal secular song form in Italy during Cara’s career, and his settings-often of anonymous or courtly amorous texts-are notable for their lyricism, clarity, and subtle formal innovation. He favored the barzelletta form (with 47 such settings), but also composed strambotti, sonnets, capitoli, and odes, and set texts by poets such as Serafino dall’Aquila, Petrarch, Matteo Bandello, and Castiglione. One text, A la absentia, is attributed to Cara himself.

Musically, Cara’s frottole are characterized by “polyphonically animated homophony”-simple harmonic frameworks enlivened by active inner voices and occasional brief imitation. Many feature music for both the ripresa (refrain) and stanza, an unusual practice in the genre. While most of his frottole are four-voice settings, some are entirely homorhythmic, and a few later works, such as Doglia che non aguali, show through-composed structures and hints of the emerging madrigal style. Cara’s sacred works, including laude and the Salve regina, further demonstrate the stylistic closeness between courtly and devotional music in this period.

Cara’s influence extended beyond his lifetime, with his music published in numerous anthologies and praised by later writers such as Cosimo Bartoli. He is regarded as the composer who most nearly bridged the gap between the frottola and the madrigal, and as a foundational figure for later Mantuan composers such as Jacquet of Mantua, Giaches de Wert, and Claudio Monteverdi.

References:
– William F. Prizer, “Marchetto Cara,” Grove Music Online
– “Marchetto Cara,” Wikipedia
– Gustave Reese, Music in the Renaissance (New York: W.W. Norton, 1954)

32. Per dolor me bagno el viso

Giacomo Fogliano (b. Modena, 1468; d. Modena, April 10, 1548) was an Italian composer, organist, and teacher, and the brother of theorist Lodovico Fogliano. Renowned in his youth as a virtuoso on the organ and harpsichord, Fogliano was praised by contemporary sources such as Parente (1483) for his skill on keyboard and other instruments.

Fogliano served as organist at Modena Cathedral from 1479 to 1497 and again from 1504 until his death, with a possible period of activity as a wind player (“piffaro”) in Siena around 1498. His responsibilities at Modena included not only playing the organ but also singing, composing, teaching choirboys, and instructing on the organ. Among his notable students was Giulio Segni, who later became a prominent keyboard composer. Fogliano was also called upon to test new organs, such as during his trip to Parma in 1543.

Fogliano’s compositional output spans both sacred and secular genres. His sacred music, likely composed in the early 16th century, includes masses and laude characterized by imitative duets, frequent homophonic episodes, and straightforward text settings. The laude, in particular, are simple and homophonic, suitable for amateur performance.

He is best known for his secular vocal music, especially frottolas, which were widely published by Petrucci from 1502 onward. These pieces display a range of textures: some are chordal and periodic, others dance-like with rhythmic contrasts, and a few (such as Occhi suavi et chiari) hint at the emerging madrigal style with more equal-voiced textures. Fogliano’s madrigals, published in 1547, are stylistically conservative and closer to the early 1530s madrigalists than to the more advanced expressive techniques of later composers.

Fogliano’s four surviving keyboard ricercares, probably composed in the late 1520s or 1530s, mark a significant step in the development of instrumental music. These works are sectional, employing imitation, instrumental figuration, and homophonic passages. Compared to earlier ricercares by Cavazzoni, Fogliano’s are more concise, better planned, and more unified, though they retain a strong influence from vocal polyphony. His innovation lies in the use of short points of imitation and the avoidance of pervasive imitation, creating variety with scalar, ostinato, and chordal passages.

Fogliano’s music bridges the late frottola tradition and the early madrigal, and his keyboard works are important in the evolution of the ricercare. He was an influential figure in Modena’s musical life for nearly seven decades, and his teaching and compositions contributed to the musical culture of early 16th-century Italy.

References:
– H. Colin Slim, “Fogliano, Giacomo,” Grove Music Online
– “Giacomo Fogliano,” Wikipedia
– Iain Fenlon, Music and Patronage in Sixteenth-Century Mantua, Cambridge University Press

Juan del Encina (b. Salamanca, July 12, 1468; d. León, late 1529 or early 1530) was a foundational Spanish poet, dramatist, and composer whose career marked a turning point in Iberian Renaissance culture.

Born Juan de Fermoselle to a shoemaker’s family in Salamanca, Encina was one of several siblings who rose to prominence in learned and artistic circles. He was likely taught music by his brother Diego, a professor at Salamanca University, and began as a choirboy at Salamanca Cathedral. By 1490, Encina had adopted his matronymic as a literary name, possibly referencing both his mother and the holm oak (encina) of Castilian and Virgilian pastoral poetry. He studied law at Salamanca, where he likely encountered the humanist Antonio de Nebrija.

Encina’s early career was closely tied to the ducal court at Alba de Tormes, for which he composed plays and lyric poetry, much of it published in his landmark Cancionero of 1496-one of the first single-author songbooks to benefit from the printing press. He sought advancement in the church and held a series of benefices, ultimately spending significant time in Rome, where he gained papal favor and served in the households of Alexander VI and Cardinal Francisco Loriz. He was granted the archdiaconate of Málaga in 1508, later resigning for a benefice at Morón. After ordination in 1519, he traveled to the Holy Land and sang his first Mass in Jerusalem. In his later years, Encina became prior of León Cathedral, a post he held until his death.

Encina was a prolific and influential writer. His Cancionero of 1496 contains lyric poetry on a wide range of themes-occasional, popular, devotional, and didactic-as well as the first eight of his eglogas (pastoral plays) and a treatise on Castilian metrics, Arte de poesía castellana. Later editions added more plays, and his dramatic works are notable for their systematic approach to lyric drama, blending sacred and secular themes, rustic and courtly elements, and integrating music as a core part of the theatrical experience. Many plays conclude with or include a villancico sung and danced by the actors, reflecting Encina’s seamless fusion of poetry, music, and performance.

Musically, Encina’s legacy centers on over 60 songs-primarily villancicos-preserved in the Cancionero Musical de Palacio and other major songbooks. These works are typically for three or four voices, and are characterized by clear phrase structure, syllabic and homophonic text setting, flexible rhythms patterned on poetic accents, and strong, simple harmonic progressions. Encina’s idiom marked a decisive break from the chanson-influenced style of earlier Spanish composers, blending popular and learned traditions and often drawing on dance forms such as the folía. His six romances are more austere and hymn-like, while many villancicos display a spontaneous, quasi-improvised quality rooted in popular song.

Encina’s influence on Spanish secular song and drama was profound, and his works mark a watershed in the evolution of the Spanish Renaissance. His originality lay in his organic integration of poetic and musical rhythm and in his ability to formalize popular traditions for courtly and literary audiences.

References:
– Isabel Pope, revised by Tess Knighton, “Encina, Juan del,” Grove Music Online
– “Cancionero de Palacio,” Wikipedia (español)
– “Juan del Encina: El ‘Cancionero’ de 1496,” MusicaAntigua.com
– “Cancionero musical de los siglos XV y XVI,” Biblioteca Digital Hispánica

Pierrequin de Thérache (b. c. 1470; d. March 30, 1528) was a French composer whose career was closely tied to the ducal court of Lorraine in Nancy, where he served as master of the choirboys and trésorier at the church of St Georges from 1492 to 1527, becoming a canon in 1505. In 1518, he was appointed maître de la chapelle privée by Antoine, Duke of Lorraine, and there is no firm evidence that he left Nancy during his tenure. Claims of his association with the French royal court or participation in the 1513 coronation of Pope Leo X in Italy remain unsubstantiated and may refer to another musician.

Despite his apparent geographic isolation, Thérache’s music circulated widely in France, Italy, and the Netherlands. His works are preserved in important manuscripts and printed sources, and his style reflects the mainstream of early 16th-century polyphony rather than provincial insularity. Thérache was particularly skilled in reworking monophonic melodies into flowing, consonant counterpoint, as seen in his settings of the sequences Verbum bonum et soave and Clare sanctorum-the former serving as the model for a polyphonic mass by Jean Mouton. His Magnificat adheres to the conventions of the period, setting only the even-numbered verses for alternatim performance.

Thérache’s cyclic masses demonstrate his mastery of cantus firmus technique and his awareness of the chanson tradition of the late 15th century. He drew upon melodic material from chansons by Antoine Busnoys and Loyset Compère, integrating them with subtlety and skill. His music often features fauxbourdon-like textures, a hallmark of his style. Notable works include the Missa ‘Comment peult avoir joye’ (likely cited by Nicolaus Wollick as by “Pierrequin de Nancy”), Missa ‘Fortuna desperata’ (borrowing from Busnoys), and Missa ‘O vos omnes’ (borrowing from Compère). Other surviving works include three four-voice motets and a Magnificat, with his music appearing in significant collections such as the Medici Codex of 1518.

Thérache’s music stands as a testament to the international character of early 16th-century French polyphony, demonstrating both technical accomplishment and stylistic awareness of the broader European musical landscape.

References:
– Richard Freedman, “Thérache, Pierrequin de,” Grove Music Online
– “Pierrequin de Thérache,” Wikipedia
– “Thérache (de), Pierrequin,” Ricercar, CESR
– R. Freedman, Music, Musicians, and the House of Lorraine during the First Half of the Sixteenth Century (PhD diss., University of Pennsylvania, 1987)

Francisco de Peñalosa (b. Talavera de la Reina, c. 1470; d. Seville, April 1, 1528) was one of the most important Spanish composers of the early 16th century, and the leading figure of his generation in the Iberian Peninsula.

Peñalosa’s career brought him into the service of the Aragonese royal chapel from 1498 to 1516, where he was maestro de música to Ferdinand’s grandson and received the highest salary paid to a singer-chaplain. He also held a canonry at Seville Cathedral, though he only took up residence there after King Ferdinand’s death. In 1517 he was invited to Rome and served in the papal choir until 1521, returning to Seville where he became archdeacon of Carmona and later treasurer of the cathedral. He died in Seville and was buried in the cathedral.

More of Peñalosa’s music survives than that of any of his Spanish contemporaries, with six complete masses, six Magnificat settings, five hymns, three Lamentation settings, over 20 motets, and 11 songs attributed to him in Iberian and New World sources. His works were highly regarded in his own country and in Rome, though his music did not circulate widely outside the Spanish sphere, partly due to the limited spread of music printing in Spain during his lifetime.

Peñalosa’s compositional style is firmly rooted in the Franco-Flemish tradition, and he was influenced by figures such as Pierre de La Rue and Alexander Agricola, whom he likely met during their visits to Spain. His six surviving masses, all for four voices, are built around a cantus firmus in the tenor, often secular in origin and frequently French. Even in his Missa ‘Ave Maria peregrina’, based on plainchant, he includes a secular chanson in the final Agnus Dei. His Missa ‘El ojo’ is the simplest, with an unadorned tenor melody, while his other masses show increasing integration of the borrowed material and experimentation with structure through contrasts of texture, scoring, meter, and declamation. Canonic writing is a hallmark, especially in the climactic Agnus Dei sections, as in the Missa ‘Ave Maria’ where a canon is combined with a retrograde version of a chanson.

His Magnificat, Lamentation settings, hymns, and some motets are based on plainchant and are generally imitative in texture. Many motets, however, are freely composed and penitential in tone, notable for their rhetorical use of homophony and textural contrast to highlight key phrases. Among his motets, Ave regina celorum is closest to the cantus-firmus style of his masses. Peñalosa’s secular songs, mostly villancicos, follow the style of Juan del Encina but with increased use of imitation; the remarkable Por las sierras de Madrid is a tour de force of simultaneous melodies and refrains.

Peñalosa’s music is marked by clarity, expressive variety, and technical ingenuity, combining the austere beauty of the Spanish tradition with the contrapuntal sophistication of the Franco-Flemish school. His influence was significant for later Spanish composers, and through his connections with Seville Cathedral, he may have directly influenced Morales. Peñalosa’s works represent a major contribution to the flowering of Iberian polyphony in the 16th century.

References:
– Tess Knighton, “Peñalosa, Francisco de,” Grove Music Online
– “Francisco de Peñalosa,” Wikipedia
– “Peñalosa: Masses,” Hyperion Records
– “Basic Repertoire List – Peñalosa,” Classical Net

Antoine de Févin (b. ?Arras, c. 1470; d. Blois, late 1511 or early 1512) was a distinguished French composer of the generation after Josquin des Prez, celebrated for the clarity and formal balance of his sacred and secular music.

Févin was born into a noble family from Febvin-Palfart near St Omer, but probably grew up in Arras. He became a priest and singer in the service of Louis XII, with his career centered at the French royal court, particularly at Orléans and Blois. His association with the court is documented from at least 1507, and he was highly regarded by his contemporaries, including Jean Mouton, who composed a déploration on his death, and by theorists such as Glarean, who described him as a “happy emulator of Josquin.” Févin died at Blois around the end of 1511 or the beginning of 1512.

Févin’s music is marked by its clarity of texture, formal design, and the new compositional style that emerged around 1490. His works are characterized by transparent points of imitation, paired imitation, and dialogue between voices, with frequent use of duets to articulate structure and contrast with fuller textures. While he paid attention to melodic lines that reflect the text, musical design generally takes precedence over textual expression.

He was highly esteemed in his own time, as evidenced by Petrucci’s publication of a volume of his masses in 1515. Of the ten masses possibly by Févin, at least four use parody technique, and several are based on Gregorian chants, incorporating paraphrases into all voices. He largely abandoned older cantus firmus techniques in favor of the new procedures pioneered by Josquin and his contemporaries. His motets are similarly innovative, relying on imaginative juxtapositions of imitative and chordal passages rather than on borrowed melodies.

Févin’s chansons, mostly in three parts, often use a popular monophonic melody as a cantus firmus in the tenor, with the outer voices imitating and interacting with it. These pieces reflect the vogue for urban entertainment music at the court of Louis XII and are notable for their charm and inventiveness.

Attribution issues complicate the study of Févin’s output, especially among his larger works. Of the ten masses attributed to him, five are also credited to other composers, and some manuscripts present conflicting or unclear ascriptions. This uncertainty makes it difficult to form a complete picture of his style, though his surviving works consistently display the technical mastery and stylistic innovations of the early 16th-century French court.

Févin’s music stands as a testament to the transition from the late medieval to the High Renaissance style in France, and his works were influential among his contemporaries and successors.

References:
– Howard Mayer Brown, revised by T. Herman Keahey, “Févin, Antoine de,” Grove Music Online
– “Antoine de Févin,” Wikipedia

Antonius Divitis (b. Leuven, c. 1470; d. c. 1530) was a South Netherlandish composer of the generation between Josquin des Prez and Adrian Willaert, renowned for his mastery of polyphonic techniques and his role in the early development of the parody mass.

Divitis, whose real name was Rycke or de Rycke (gallicized as Le Riche and latinized as Divitis), began his career in the Low Countries. In 1501, he was engaged at St Donatian in Bruges as instructor of choirboys and succentor. After a brief tenure at St Rombout’s in Mechelen, he joined the chapel of Philip the Fair in Brussels in 1505, working alongside prominent contemporaries such as Alexander Agricola and Pierre de La Rue. He traveled with the court to Spain in 1506, remaining until the chapel was disbanded in 1508 after Philip’s death.

By 1510, Divitis was appointed master of the chapel for Anne of Brittany, queen of France, and after her death in 1514, he served in the French royal chapel under Louis XII and François I. He was among the musicians at the king’s funeral in 1515 and continued in royal service until at least 1525. His later years are less well documented, but a Missa pro fidelibus defunctis Anthonius Divitiis pie memorie in a manuscript copied before 1534 suggests he had died by then.

Divitis’s surviving works include three parody masses, two mass sections, three Magnificat settings, eight motets (three incomplete), and one chanson. His music was widely published and circulated during his lifetime and beyond. Notable works include the Missa ‘Quem dicunt homines’ (printed by Giunta in 1522), the canonic motets Ista est speciosa and Per lignum crucis, and a five-part Salve regina based on “Adieu mes amours.” Divitis favored five- and six-part textures outside his parody masses, which are for four voices.

He was a pioneer in the use of parody technique, basing new masses not just on a single voice or theme but on the principal motifs of existing works-a practice that became central to 16th-century mass composition. His Missa super ‘Si dedero’ is based on Agricola’s song-motet, likely reflecting their time together in Philip the Fair’s chapel. The Missa ‘Quem dicunt homines’ is based on a motet by Richafort and may have been composed in friendly rivalry with Jean Mouton. The Missa ‘Gaude Barbara’ is based on a motet attributed to Mouton, perhaps as homage.

Divitis’s music is notable for its technical skill, inventive use of parody, and preference for rich, multi-voiced textures. His duos were admired and included in didactic collections, and his influence is evident in the works of his contemporaries and successors. Despite some confusion in attributions-particularly with works also ascribed to Antoine de Févin-Divitis is recognized as a key figure in the transition from the late 15th-century style to the mature polyphony of the High Renaissance.

References:
– Martin Picker, “Divitis, Antonius,” Grove Music Online
– “Antonius Divitis,” Wikipedia

Bartolomeo Tromboncino (b. in or near Verona, 1470; d. in or near Venice, after 1534) was one of Italy’s most prolific and influential frottola composers of the early 16th century, alongside Marchetto Cara.

Tromboncino was born into a musical family in Verona, the son of Bernardino Piffaro, a municipal wind player. He likely trained as a trombonist in Verona’s civic ensemble before entering the service of Francesco II Gonzaga, Marquis of Mantua, by 1489. He became closely associated with Isabella d’Este, serving as her composer, lutenist, accompanist, and tutor. Tromboncino’s career was marked by turbulence: he fled Mantua multiple times, most infamously after murdering his wife in 1499, but was repeatedly pardoned and returned to court service.

He was active at the courts of Mantua, Ferrara (where he served Lucrezia Borgia and later Cardinal Ippolito d’Este), and Venice. In Ferrara, he participated in courtly entertainments and composed dramatic and ceremonial music. By 1518, he had settled in Venice, where he established a school for gentlewomen and continued composing and teaching. He was still active in Venice in the 1530s, and his students were renowned throughout the Veneto.

Tromboncino’s sacred output includes a motet (Benedictus Dominus Deus), a Lamentations cycle, and 17 laude (devotional songs in Italian and Latin). His sacred music is varied, ranging from simple, homorhythmic textures to more complex polyphony, but generally avoids the imitative style favored by northern contemporaries. His laude include political prayers and contrafacta of secular works, reflecting both courtly and devotional functions.

Tromboncino’s greatest importance lies in secular music. He is credited with 170 frottolas-more than any other composer-including barzellette, strambotti, sonnets, odes, capitoli, and works in Spanish and Latin. He was particularly innovative in his choice of texts, setting serious and madrigalian poetry (notably by Petrarch) earlier than most of his peers. He collaborated with leading poets such as Galeotto del Carretto, Sannazaro, Ariosto, and Bembo, and composed music for courtly and theatrical occasions.

Musically, his frottolas are notable for their non-imitative polyphony, active inner voices, and frequent cadences at poetic line endings. While many works are chordal, Tromboncino’s textures are often more complex than those of Cara, and his interest in dramatic and sacred genres made him a more versatile composer. His works reflect the fixed poetic forms of the frottola but display subtle variety and theatrical flair.

Tromboncino’s output waned after his 1521 petition for a composer’s patent in Venice, after which few of his works were published. Nonetheless, his influence persisted through his students and the continued performance of his music at Italian courts.

References:
– William F. Prizer, “Tromboncino, Bartolomeo,” Grove Music Online
– “Bartolomeo Tromboncino,” Wikipedia

33. Non val aqua al mio gran foco

Pierre Alamire (b. Nuremberg, c. 1470; d. Mechelen, June 26, 1536) was a South Netherlandish music scribe, spy, and diplomat of German birth, renowned for producing some of the most luxurious and comprehensive manuscripts of Franco-Flemish Renaissance polyphony.

Born into the Nuremberg merchant family Imhof, Alamire settled in the Netherlands by the 1490s. He became the principal music scribe for the Habsburg court, serving Margaret of Austria (regent of the Netherlands), Emperor Charles V, and Mary of Hungary. Between 1495 and 1535, he supervised the creation of over 60 music manuscripts, including lavish choirbooks and practical partbooks, which preserved works by Josquin des Prez, Pierre de La Rue, Jean Mouton, Antoine de Févin, Jacob Obrecht, Heinrich Isaac, and others. These manuscripts were commissioned for royal chapels, confraternities, and elite patrons such as Henry VIII, Pope Leo X, and the Fugger family.

Alamire’s workshop in Mechelen and Brussels became a hub for music production. He collaborated with scribes designated as “Netherlands court scribes B, B1, C, and C1,” though his own hand is identifiable in informal annotations. His manuscripts, such as the Choirbook of Margaret of Austria and the Medici Codex, are celebrated for their precision, artistic decoration, and inclusion of nearly the entire output of Pierre de La Rue. Beyond copying, Alamire sold instruments, advised on mining, and engaged in espionage. From 1515 to 1518, he acted as a double agent for Henry VIII and the Yorkist pretender Richard de la Pole, gathering intelligence during travels to Metz, Wittenberg, and France.

Alamire’s legacy lies in his role as a cultural intermediary. His manuscripts disseminated Franco-Flemish polyphony across Europe, influencing both sacred and secular music traditions. Despite his retirement in 1534, he continued supplying music to Mary of Hungary until his death in 1536. His dual identity as scribe and spy underscores the interconnected worlds of Renaissance art, politics, and intrigue.

References:
– Herbert Kellman, “Alamire, Pierre,” Grove Music Online
– “Music and its media: The music manuscripts of the Alamire workshop,” Open University
– H. Kellman, The Treasury of Petrus Alamire: Music and Art in Flemish Court Manuscripts 1500–1535 (Ghent, 1999)

Carpentras (b. Carpentras, c. 1470; d. Avignon, 14 June 1548), born Elzéar Genet, was a French composer whose career spanned the transition from the late 15th to the mid-16th century and who played a significant role in both French and Italian sacred music.

Carpentras began his professional life in Avignon, where he was appointed to a choral position in 1505. By 1508, he had moved to Rome, likely at the invitation of Pope Julius II, and soon became a singer in the papal chapel. His reputation grew rapidly, and in 1513, Pope Leo X appointed him as the first official master of the papal chapel-a largely administrative but prestigious post. Carpentras was also responsible for recruiting and overseeing singers, including bringing choirboys from France. His close relationship with both Leo X and the French royal court is reflected in the numerous benefices he received and his role as a musical intermediary between France and Italy.

After Leo X’s death, Carpentras returned to Avignon, possibly due to the less supportive artistic climate under Adrian VI. He remained active in Avignon for most of his later life, though he may have made brief visits to Rome. Around 1526, Carpentras began to suffer from severe tinnitus, a condition that motivated him to undertake the ambitious project of publishing his complete sacred works-a pioneering effort for a composer of his era. The resulting four-volume collection, printed in Avignon by Jean de Channey between 1532 and 1535, included masses, Lamentations, hymns, and Magnificat settings. This publication not only cemented his reputation but also provides modern scholars with a remarkably comprehensive view of his sacred output.

While Carpentras is best known for his sacred music, he did compose some secular works. He claimed to have abandoned chansons and love songs upon joining the papal chapel, but a handful of witty French chansons and several Italian pieces in the frottola style survive. His Italian secular works, including settings of Petrarch, show a preference for clear textures and literary quality, reflecting the influence of humanist ideals.

Carpentras was notable for his focus on music for the Divine Office, such as Lamentations, hymns, and Magnificats-genres that had been somewhat neglected by his contemporaries. His approach to these forms, emphasizing clear structures, alternating homophonic and imitative textures, and careful handling of cantus firmi, influenced younger composers like Costanzo Festa and Adrian Willaert. Carpentras’s music is marked by a balance between contrapuntal skill and formal clarity, with expressive restraint and a preference for sonority and color over dramatic dissonance.

He died in Avignon in 1548, leaving a legacy as a bridge between the French and Italian traditions and as a model for later generations of composers interested in liturgical music.

References:
– Howard Mayer Brown, revised by Richard Sherr, “Carpentras,” Grove Music Online
– Jessie Ann Owens, “Carpentras,” in Companion to Medieval and Renaissance Music, ed. Tess Knighton and David Fallows (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992)
– Honey Meconi, Early Musical Borrowing (New York: Routledge, 2004)

Mathurin Forestier (fl. c. 1500–1535) was a French composer active in the early 16th century, best known for his sacred polyphony that reflects the influence of leading Franco-Flemish masters.

Little is certain about Forestier’s life. Some scholars, notably Edward Lowinsky, have proposed that he may be the same individual as Mathurin Dubuysson, who sang at the Sainte-Chapelle in Paris between 1489 and 1513. If this identification is correct, Forestier would have been born around 1470 and possibly lived into the 1530s. His works are found alongside those of prominent composers such as Josquin des Prez and Jean Mouton in manuscripts associated with the Netherlandish court, suggesting he was part of a distinguished musical milieu.

Forestier’s surviving sacred music includes three Masses and two motets, all edited in Corpus Mensurabilis Musicae (CMM, vol. 104, 1996). His Missa ‘Intemerata virgo’ for four voices is based on sections of Josquin’s Vultum tuum, while the five-voice Missa ‘Baises moy’ draws on Josquin’s chanson of the same name. The Missa ‘L’homme armé’, also for five voices and sometimes attributed to Mouton, is particularly notable for its final section: a remarkable canon for seven voices built from a single line on the famous tune. Forestier’s motets, Alma chorus domini (four voices) and Veni Sancte Spiritus (six voices, also attributed to Josquin), display a fondness for canonic and imitative textures that echo the styles of Josquin and Mouton.

A handful of secular works are also attributed to Forestier, though their authorship is less certain. Three four-voice chansons-L’aultre jour en ung jardin, Frere Bidault, and O cruaulté qui m’as mis-appear in later sources and may have been composed by a different musician, as they are credited only to “Forestier” with no first name. Similarly, a three-voice instrumental setting of La hault d’alemaigne from 1504, attributed simply to “Mathurin,” may or may not be his work.

Forestier’s sacred music is characterized by its technical mastery, inventive use of canon, and a stylistic affinity with the leading composers of his generation. Though biographical details remain elusive, his works contribute to our understanding of the rich polyphonic tradition of the early 16th century.

References:
– Thomas G. MacCracken, “Forestier, Mathurin,” Grove Music Online
– Honey Meconi, Early Musical Borrowing (New York: Routledge, 2004)
– Jessie Ann Owens and Anthony M. Cummings, eds., Music in Renaissance Cities and Courts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997)

Bartolomeo degli Organi (b. Florence, Dec 24, 1474; d. Florence, Dec 12, 1539) was a prominent Italian composer, organist, and singer whose career was deeply intertwined with the musical and cultural life of Renaissance Florence.

Nicknamed “degli Organi” in recognition of his profession, Bartolomeo began his musical journey as a choirboy at the church of Ss Annunziata shortly after turning thirteen. His reputation as a skilled singer and organist quickly grew, leading to appointments at several important Florentine churches, including Ss Annunziata, S Maria Novella, and ultimately the cathedral, where he served as principal organist from 1509 until his death. His talents also brought him into the service of Lorenzo de’ Medici, Duke of Urbino, reflecting his close ties to Florence’s leading families and intellectual circles.

Bartolomeo was highly regarded by his contemporaries and played a central role in shaping the city’s musical scene. He was described as “the prince of musicians of our city” and counted among his pupils notable figures such as Guido Machiavelli and the composer Francesco de Layolle. His friendships with poets like Lorenzo Strozzi and Benedetto Varchi demonstrate his integration into Florence’s artistic elite; Strozzi’s poems were set to music by Bartolomeo, and Varchi penned a sonnet in his memory.

His surviving works include ten Italian secular songs (eight ballatas, one strambotto, and a canto carnascialesco), four instrumental pieces, and a lauda. These compositions are notable for their clear phrasing, logical harmonic progressions, and rhythmic sensitivity to the natural accents of the Italian language. Bartolomeo often introduced new music for entire stanzas or refrains in his ballatas, a forward-looking technique that anticipated developments in the early madrigal. His lauda, published in Razzi’s 1563 collection, as well as a carnival song adapted into a sacred context, show the fluid boundaries between secular and devotional music in his output. The instrumental pieces reveal stylistic affinities with works by Heinrich Isaac and Alexander Agricola, suggesting possible study or collaboration with these composers during their time in Florence.

Bartolomeo’s musical legacy continued through his children: Antonio and Lorenzo, both organists, and Piero (Pierino Fiorentino), who became a celebrated student of Francesco da Milano and a respected composer. The family’s influence extended into the next generation, with “Baccio degli Organi” likely being his grandson and active as a music teacher at the Medici court.

Bartolomeo degli Organi’s contributions exemplify the vibrant musical culture of Renaissance Florence, bridging the worlds of sacred, secular, and instrumental music.

References:
– Frank A. D’Accone, “Bartolomeo degli Organi,” Grove Music Online
– Lewis Lockwood, Music in Renaissance Florence (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984)
– Iain Fenlon, Music and Culture in Late Renaissance Italy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002)

Robert Cowper (b. c.1474; d. 1535–1540) was an English composer and churchman active during the early Tudor period, known for his service in both academic and ecclesiastical circles.

Cowper began his career as a clerk at King’s College, Cambridge, from 1493 to 1495, earning his MusB in 1493 and MusD in 1507. He was ordained as a priest in 1498 and held several rectorships over his lifetime, including posts at Snodhill (Herefordshire), Lydiard Tregoz (Gloucestershire), East Horsley (Surrey), Latchington (Essex), and Snargate (Kent). He was likely associated with Lady Margaret Beaufort’s chapel choir between 1504 and 1509 and may also have had links to the Abbey at Bury St Edmunds.

Cowper’s reputation as a musician was recognized by later generations: Thomas Morley cited him in his influential Plaine and Easie Introduction (1597), and Francis Meres listed him among England’s “excellent musicians” in Palladis Tamia (1598). His music was included in inventories of King’s College, Cambridge, as late as 1529, indicating continued esteem for his compositions.

Although only a small number of Cowper’s works survive, they are significant for their place in early 16th-century English polyphony. He is thought to have written both sacred and secular music, and some scholars have suggested he may be the composer of the song “Time to pass” from John Rastell’s interlude The Four Elements, based on circumstantial connections to Bridgnorth.

Cowper’s legacy is that of a respected composer whose music bridged the worlds of the university, the church, and the Tudor court, earning him a place among the notable English musicians of his generation.

References:
– David Greer, “Cowper, Robert,” Grove Music Online
– John Harley, The World of William Byrd: Musicians, Merchants and Magnates (Routledge, 2016)
– David Skinner, “The Choirbook Repertory of Tudor England,” in The Cambridge Companion to English Renaissance Music, ed. John Morehen (Cambridge, 2010)

Filippo de Lurano (b. probably Cremona, c. 1470; d. after 1520) was an Italian composer and priest, renowned for his significant contributions to the frottola repertoire during the early 16th century.

Lurano’s origins are debated, but documentary evidence points to Cremona, as he is listed as “clericus Cremonensis” in the records of Cividale del Friuli Cathedral. He spent much of his career in Rome at the turn of the 16th century, where his music was closely associated with the city’s vibrant cultural life. His frottola Donna, contra la mia voglia was reportedly a favorite of Cesare Borgia (Duke Valentino), and several of his works made their way from Rome to Florence, attesting to his popularity.

By the early 1500s, Lurano was the most represented composer in a major Roman manuscript (GB-Lbl Egerton 3051). He left Rome by 1512, taking up a singing post at S Maria Assunta in Cividale, and was later active at Aquileia Cathedral. He was succeeded in 1520 by Jacopo Lurano, likely a relative. Lurano’s reputation extended beyond Italy, as he was mentioned among notable composers in Filippo Oriolo’s poem Monte Parnassus.

Lurano’s output includes a secular motet, several laude, and about 35 frottolas-most published by Petrucci between 1504 and 1509. His frottolas are primarily set to texts in the barzelletta form, but he also composed settings of odes, capitoli, strambotti, and Latin poems. Notable among his works are carnival songs and mascheratas, such as Son Fortuna omnipotente and Noi l’amazone siamo, which reflect the lively and sometimes risqué spirit of Roman festivities.

His music is distinguished by its well-crafted melodies, clear structure, and the effective interplay between homorhythmic and lightly imitative textures. Lurano frequently set texts that form pairs or thematic responses, demonstrating a sensitivity to poetic nuance. His Dissimulare etiam sperasti, based on Dido’s lament from Virgil’s Aeneid, is notable for its expressive, recitative-like style and through-composed form. The secular motet Quis deus hic? Phoebus stands out for its depiction of Apollo among the muses, with a playful tenor line.

Among frottola composers, Lurano is considered just behind the leading figures of Marchetto Cara and Bartolomeo Tromboncino, and on par with Michele Pesenti. His works reflect both the artistry and the popular appeal that characterized the frottola at its height.

References:
– William F. Prizer, “Filippo de Lurano,” Grove Music Online
– Iain Fenlon, Music and Culture in Late Renaissance Italy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002)
– James Haar, “The Frottola,” in Companion to Medieval and Renaissance Music, ed. Tess Knighton and David Fallows (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992)

Antoine de Longueval (b. probably Longueval, Somme; fl. 1498–1525) was a French composer active at the highest levels of European court and chapel music during the transition from the late 15th to the early 16th century.

Longueval’s early origins are thought to be in the diocese of Arras, based on papal documentation, though some Italian sources refer to him as “Antonio d’Orléans,” possibly hinting at an early post or mistaken identity. He first appears in historical records as a member of Queen Anne of Brittany’s household in 1498, and by the early 1500s was serving at the court of Savoy, where he was the highest-paid singer. His career was notably cosmopolitan: while still officially attached to Savoy, he was also employed by Alfonso d’Este in Ferrara, and by 1507 had become a private musician (valet de chambre) to King Louis XII of France.

Longueval’s prominence continued under François I, who appointed him maître de chapelle of the royal chapel in 1515. He also held important ecclesiastical posts, including canonries at Ste Chapelle in Bourges and Notre Dame in Paris, and later became abbot of St Pierre, Longueville. His expertise was recognized internationally, and he was made an apostolic notary by Pope Leo X in 1515. Longueval’s last known court activity was in 1525, and he likely died soon after.

His most influential composition is the Passio Domini nostri, a Passion motet that may have been composed for Holy Week in Ferrara in 1504. The work is notable for its expressive variety, shifting textures, and innovative use of the Passion narrative, blending chant-inspired recitation with rich polyphonic writing. This piece became a model for later Passion settings, especially in Lutheran Germany, where it circulated widely and influenced many 16th-century composers.

Other surviving works by Longueval include the motets Benedicat nos and Benedicite Deum, as well as the chanson Alle regres, which is based on the tenor of Hayne van Ghizeghem’s Les grans regrets. These pieces demonstrate his skill in varied textures, expressive melismas, and inventive canonic writing. Some works attributed to him in diplomatic correspondence remain unidentified.

Longueval’s music stands out for its structural variety, expressive depth, and technical mastery, reflecting the international style of the High Renaissance and the cosmopolitan musical life of the French and Italian courts.

References:
– Jeffrey Dean, “Longueval, Antoine de,” Grove Music Online
– Honey Meconi, Early Musical Borrowing (New York: Routledge, 2004)
– Jessie Ann Owens and Anthony M. Cummings, eds., Music in Renaissance Cities and Courts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997)

Nicolas Champion (b. in or near Liège, c. 1475; d. Lier, Sept 20, 1533) was a Franco-Flemish composer and singer who played a prominent role in the musical life of the Habsburg courts during the High Renaissance.

Champion was the brother of Jacques Champion and was closely associated with the court chapels of Philip the Fair and Charles V, two of the most influential patrons of early 16th-century music. There is also evidence suggesting he may have had connections with the court of Frederick the Wise, Duke of Saxony, reflecting the international reach of his career.

His surviving works include two masses for five voices-Missa supra Maria Magdalena and Missa ducis Saxsonie ‘Sing ich niet wohl’-as well as two psalm motets (Beati omnes for six voices and Deus in adjutorium for four voices) and a four-voice Flemish chanson, Noch weet ick. These compositions exemplify the sophisticated polyphonic style of the Franco-Flemish school at its height.

Champion’s music is distinguished by its intricate textures, proportional structures, and the interplay of contrasting motives. His writing often features elaborate discantus parts, rhythmic complexity, and expressive modal shifts reminiscent of Ockeghem and La Rue, while also incorporating Josquinian techniques such as imitative paraphrase, clear text setting, and systematic tonal planning. Particularly notable is his use of cyclical forms and thematic recall, which lend his works a strong sense of unity and architectural coherence.

Champion’s advanced contrapuntal style and melodic invention place him among the foremost composers of his generation. His works circulated widely in both German and Spanish sources, attesting to his influence beyond the Low Countries. Today, his music stands as a testament to the technical brilliance and expressive depth of the High Renaissance polyphonic tradition.

References:
– Nors S. Josephson, “Champion, Nicolas,” Grove Music Online
– Honey Meconi, Early Musical Borrowing (New York: Routledge, 2004)
– Jessie Ann Owens and Anthony M. Cummings, eds., Music in Renaissance Cities and Courts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997)

Andreas de Silva (b. c.1475–80) was a Renaissance composer and singer, active in Italy during the early 16th century. Though his exact nationality remains uncertain, stylistic evidence suggests he may have had Spanish roots, with formative musical experiences in French court circles and later in northern Italy.

De Silva’s career reached its height in Rome, where he was associated with the papal chapel under Pope Leo X. In 1513, he composed the motet Gaude felix Florentia to celebrate Leo X’s election. He was listed as both “cantor et compositor” of the papal chapel and “cantor secretus” of the pope’s private chapel in 1519 and 1520. De Silva likely remained in Rome until just before 1522, after which he received patronage from the Duke of Mantua. Records indicate he was still active in Italy at the end of the 1520s.

Highly esteemed by his contemporaries, de Silva was later praised by Cosimo Bartoli in 1567 as one of Josquin’s successors who “taught the world how music should be written.” His music was influential enough that five of his motets became the basis for parody masses by composers such as Arcadelt, Cellavenia, Lupus Italus, and Palestrina.

De Silva’s main creative period spanned from about 1510 to 1530. He was part of a generation that bridged the late 15th-century Franco-Flemish tradition and the emerging styles of Willaert, Morales, and Gombert. His masses include both traditional cantus firmus settings (such as those on Angelus ad pastores ait and Tu es pastor ovium) and more innovative works that incorporate chanson melodies and solmization subjects (Missa ‘La mi sol fa mi’). His approach to mass composition was flexible, blending established techniques with imaginative variation and textural color.

De Silva’s music is distinguished by its clear formal structures, expressive melodies, and sensitive text setting. His motets, in particular, are noted for their extroverted style and harmonic richness. Works like Omnis pulchritudo Domini, Illumina oculos meos, and Ave regina caelorum, ave domina angelorum are considered among the most compelling sacred vocal music of the early 16th century.

Although his surviving output is relatively small, Andreas de Silva’s originality and technical mastery make him a significant figure in the transition from the mature High Renaissance style toward the Late Renaissance.

References:
– Winfried Kirsch, “Andreas de Silva,” Grove Music Online
– Jessie Ann Owens and Anthony M. Cummings, eds., Music in Renaissance Cities and Courts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997)
– Honey Meconi, Early Musical Borrowing (New York: Routledge, 2004)

34. Omnis pulchritudo Domini: Ascendes Christus

Marco Dall’Aquila (b. c.1480; d. after 1538) was a distinguished Italian lutenist and composer whose work marks a pivotal stage in the evolution of Renaissance lute music, bridging the late 15th century and the High Renaissance.

Dall’Aquila’s reputation was well established by the early 16th century. In 1505, he was granted a ten-year privilege by the Venetian authorities to publish lute tablatures, positioning him as a competitor to the famed printer Ottaviano Petrucci. While no printed editions from this privilege are known to survive, the principal manuscript source for his music (D-Mbs 266) may reflect a lost publication. His expertise was widely recognized: Pietro Aaron, a leading theorist, consulted him on musical matters around 1524, and Pietro Aretino referred to him as “my master Marco Dall’Aquila” in a 1537 letter from Venice.

Stylistically, Dall’Aquila stands just before Francesco da Milano, to whom he is often compared. While some of his preludes and ricercars echo the improvisatory style of Petrucci’s earlier lutenists, most of his ricercar-fantasias display a mature use of imitation and dialogue, anticipating the classic forms that Francesco would later perfect. Dall’Aquila’s approach often favors structural repetition reminiscent of the frottola and Parisian chanson, rather than the continuously evolving forms typical of earlier ricercars.

His compositions are notable for their idiomatic exploitation of the lute’s capabilities. For example, one ricercar senza canto is written entirely on the five lowest courses, while another piece gradually introduces each course, building from the lowest string to a full, resonant texture. These works reveal a deep understanding of the instrument’s expressive and technical possibilities.

Dall’Aquila was recognized by contemporaries as a leading figure in the development of a new style of lute music. In the preface to Francesco da Milano’s 1536 publication, Francesco Marcolini named Dall’Aquila, along with Alberto da Ripa, as a worthy successor to earlier masters such as Giovanni Maria Alemanni and Giovanni Angelo Testagrossa.

Marco Dall’Aquila’s works display the clarity, imitative textures, and formal balance characteristic of the High Renaissance and his innovations in lute technique and structure place him at the forefront of early 16th-century instrumental music.

References:
– Arthur J. Ness, “Dall’Aquila, Marco,” Grove Music Online
– Victor Coelho, The Manuscript Sources of Seventeenth-Century Italian Lute Music (New York: Garland, 1995)
– Martin Shepherd, “The Lute in the Sixteenth Century,” in The Cambridge Companion to the Guitar, ed. Victor Coelho (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003)

Ninot le Petit (fl. c. 1500) was a French composer whose identity remains uncertain, partly due to the commonality of his name and the nature of his nickname. The diminutive “Ninot” likely derives from Jean or Giovanni, while “le Petit” is not believed to be a family name.

Several of his motets-such as In illo tempore, Psallite Noe, and Si oblitus fuero-appear in important early 16th-century manuscripts with varying attributions, sometimes to “Jo. le Petit” and sometimes to “Ninot.” This has led scholars to propose different identifications. One candidate is Johannes Baltazar alias Petit, a singer in the papal chapel from 1488 until shortly before his death in 1502, who also held a prebend at Narbonne. A letter signed “J. Petit alias Baltazar” addressed to Giovanni de’ Medici in 1493 supports this connection.

However, references to “Nynot” among composers active after 1502, including his mention in the motet Mater floreat by Pierre Moulu, suggest that Ninot le Petit was likely alive well into the early decades of the 16th century and associated with the French royal chapel. Musicological research favors identifying him with Jean Lepetit, maître de la psallette at Langres Cathedral from 1506 to 1510 and a canon there until 1529. The presence of Ninot’s mass in choirbooks from Casale Monferrato alongside works by composers linked to Langres supports this theory.

Ninot’s motets are characterized by clear structural and harmonic design typical of the French royal chapel’s style around 1500. They often include contrasting triple-meter sections and share stylistic traits with composers such as Antoine de Févin and Jean Mouton. For example, Psallite Noe appears modeled on Mouton’s Sancti Dei omnes. One motet, Planxit autem David, while sometimes attributed to Ninot, is more convincingly linked to Josquin des Prez based on its distinctive style.

His surviving chansons, thirteen of which appear together in a single manuscript, are extended and playful pieces that blend imitation with homophonic textures and feature lively rhythmic contrasts. These chansons often set texts assembled from popular or humorous material, highlighting Ninot’s skill in crafting light-hearted secular music. Among these, Mon seal plaisir follows a traditional forme fixe and appears in earlier sources, while Si bibero humorously references a series of similarly titled works by other composers of the period.

Two of Ninot’s chansons are notable for their compact canonic writing, linking them to a tradition dating back to the 1470s.

Though much about Ninot le Petit’s life remains obscure, his music marks him as a leading figure in the French royal chapel’s repertoire during the early 16th century. His works exemplify the stylistic clarity, expressive polyphony, and formal innovation characteristic of the High Renaissance, positioning him among the foremost composers of his generation in France

References:
– David Fallows and Jeffrey Dean, “Ninot le Petit,” Grove Music Online
– Richard Hudson, ed., The Motets of Johannes Baltazar alias Petit (Recent Researches in the Music of the Renaissance, 2006)
– Bonnie J. Blackburn and Leofranc Holford-Strevens, The Oxford Companion to the Year (Oxford University Press, 1999)

Noel Bauldeweyn (b. c.1480; fl. 1509–1513) was a Franco-Flemish composer whose music spans the transition from the late 15th-century Netherlandish tradition to the mature polyphonic style of the High Renaissance.

Bauldeweyn served as magister cantorum at St Rombouts in Mechelen from 1509 to 1513, a prestigious post previously held by Jean Richafort. After 1513, his activities are not documented, and earlier attributions to positions in Antwerp and records of his death have been shown to refer to other individuals.

Bauldeweyn’s music achieved wide circulation and high regard across Europe, appearing in sources from the Low Countries, Italy, Spain, Bohemia, and Germany well into the late 16th century. Seven masses are securely attributed to him, alongside at least thirteen motets and a handful of secular works, most notably the chanson En douleur en tristesse. His Missa Da pacem was long attributed to Josquin des Prez, a testament to both its quality and stylistic affinity with the greatest composers of the era.

Bauldeweyn’s style is marked by a blend of older and newer techniques. His early works, such as the six-voice Missa sine nomine, show the influence of late 15th-century composers with their use of canon, low tessitura, and sometimes austere textures. As his style matured, he embraced the imitative polyphony and harmonic clarity associated with Josquin and his contemporaries. Many of his works are for five or six voices, featuring full textures, rhythmic vitality, and a sophisticated approach to structure, including thematic repetition and ostinato. His later masses, such as Missa Quam pulchra es, display refined dissonance treatment, antiphonal textures, and expressive text setting.

Bauldeweyn’s music was admired for its contrapuntal skill and inventive use of canon, and his best works stand alongside those of his more famous contemporaries. The wide dissemination of his compositions and their presence in major manuscript collections, including those from the Alamire workshop, underscore his reputation during and after his lifetime.

References:
– Edgar H. Sparks, revised by Bernadette Nelson, “Bauldeweyn, Noel,” Grove Music Online
– “Noel Bauldeweyn,” Wikipedia
– Edgar H. Sparks, The Music of Noel Bauldeweyn (New York: American Musicological Society, 1972)

Jean l’Héritier (b. c.1480; d. after 1551) was a French composer active across Europe during the early 16th century, renowned for his refined motets and his role in shaping the High Renaissance style.

Born in the former diocese of Thérouanne (now Pas-de-Calais), l’Héritier was described in Avignon notarial records as a “clericus morinensis diocesis.” He was likely a student of Josquin des Prez, possibly encountering him in France during Josquin’s brief time at the royal court. L’Héritier’s earliest documented appearance in Italy was at the court of Ferrara in 1506–08. By 1514, he was recorded in Rome, and from 1521 to 1522, he served as maestro di cappella at San Luigi dei Francesi, the French national church in Rome. His music was widely disseminated in Roman manuscripts and prints, reflecting his prominence in the city’s musical life.

After his Roman period, l’Héritier was active at the court of Federico Gonzaga in Mantua by 1525, before moving to serve the Bishop of Verona. He enjoyed the patronage of Cardinal François de Clermont, who awarded him several benefices, and he was still alive as late as 1552. Later sources suggest he may have spent time in Venetian territories, and he was remembered as a teacher by Pietro Gaetano, a singer at San Marco.

L’Héritier’s music survives in at least 66 manuscripts and 45 printed collections from the 16th century, with the majority of sources originating in Italy but also found throughout Europe. His only known mass, Missa ‘On a mal dit de mon amy’, is a parody mass modeled on a chanson by Févin, using its imitative points as structural pillars. His Magnificat settings retain traditional liturgical features, with the reciting tone migrating between voices or woven into the texture through imitation.

The heart of l’Héritier’s output is his motet repertoire. He favored Latin texts drawn from antiphons, psalms, responsories, and devotional poetry, and his works often employ structural repetition or refrain-like devices for formal clarity. In settings of Marian antiphons, he skillfully integrates plainsong melodies, sometimes using extended note values or canonic techniques to heighten sonority and meaning. His only securely attributed chanson, Jan, petit Jan, exemplifies the light, declamatory style popular in France during the 1520s.

L’Héritier’s compositional style is characterized by elegant imitation, balanced with passages of homophony for expressive or structural effect. His melodic writing features smooth, arching lines and careful attention to modal coherence, anticipating the clarity and poise of Palestrina. The even spacing of imitative entries and the use of modal cadences reflect a sophisticated approach to counterpoint and text setting.

References:
– Leeman L. Perkins, “Jean l’Héritier,” Grove Music Online
– Jessie Ann Owens and Anthony M. Cummings, eds., Music in Renaissance Cities and Courts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997)
– Honey Meconi, Early Musical Borrowing (New York: Routledge, 2004)

35. Nigra sum sed formosa II

Andrea Antico (b. Montona [now Motovun], Istria, c. 1480; d. after 1538) was a music printer, woodblock cutter, editor, publisher, and composer of the Renaissance, whose pioneering activities in Rome and Venice helped shape the landscape of early 16th-century music publishing.

Antico began his career in Rome, where he became the city’s first music printer with his Canzoni nove (1510), a collection of frottole that drew heavily on Petrucci’s earlier Venetian publications. Unlike Petrucci, who used movable type and a multi-impression process, Antico specialized in woodblock printing, producing music and text in a single impression. This method, though labor-intensive, allowed for visually striking results and made Antico one of the most skilled woodblock printers of his era.

His early Roman editions included both sacred and secular music, and in 1513, Antico secured from Pope Leo X the first papal privilege for music printing in the Papal States, giving him a ten-year copyright. He soon received a further privilege for printing organ tablature, which had originally been granted to Petrucci but was revoked due to Petrucci’s inactivity in this area.

Antico’s most ambitious Roman publication was the Liber quindecim missarum (1516), a large-format choirbook featuring masses by Josquin, Brumel, Févin, Mouton, and others. The title page famously depicts Antico presenting the book to Pope Leo X, and the dedication reveals that he spent nearly three years preparing the edition. This publication set a new standard for sacred music printing in Rome.

In 1517, Antico published Frottole intabulate da sonare organi, the first printed book of Italian keyboard music. The collection, mainly arrangements of frottole by Bartolomeo Tromboncino, was intended for keyboard instruments in general (as depicted by a harpsichord on the title page), and its papal privilege effectively excluded Petrucci from this lucrative market.

After moving to Venice in 1520, Antico entered into partnership with Luc’Antonio Giunta and continued to publish both reprints and new editions, including Frottole de Misser Bortolomio Tromboncino & de Misser Marcheto Carra (voice and lute arrangements), three books of Motetti novi, and important collections of masses and sacred music. From 1533, he worked for the Scotto family, producing blocks for publications such as Verdelot’s madrigals and Mottetti di Adrian Willaert, libro secondo a quattro voci (1539), his last known publication.

Antico also composed, including two frottole published under his name in Canzoni … libro tertio (1513), written in a simple, homophonic style. Some pieces attributed to “A(dam) de Antiquis” in early 16th-century prints have been linked to him, but this identification remains doubtful.

Antico’s career was marked by innovation, rivalry with Petrucci, and a lasting influence on the development of music printing. His editions, especially of sacred music and keyboard intabulations, set new standards for both content and craftsmanship in early music publishing.

References:
– Martin Picker, “Andrea Antico,” Grove Music Online
– “Andrea Antico,” Wikipedia
– Alexander Meszler, “Reevaluating Andrea Antico’s Frottole of 1517,” The Diapason
– Ted Gioia, “When a Single Person Controlled the Copyright on All Music (Even Church Music),” The Honest Broker

Thomas Stoltzer (b. Schweidnitz [now Świdnica], Silesia, c. 1480; d. near Znaim [now Znojmo], Moravia, early 1526) was a German composer of the early 16th century, renowned for his sacred vocal works that bridged late medieval traditions and Renaissance innovations.

Stoltzer’s early career unfolded in Breslau, where he served as a priest and held ecclesiastical positions at St. Elisabeth and the cathedral. Though his later works reflect Lutheran sympathies, he maintained caution during the Reformation to preserve his livelihood. In 1522, he became magister capellae at the Hungarian royal court under King Louis II, likely due to the patronage of Queen Mary, who commissioned his landmark settings of Luther’s psalm translations.

His compositions span masses, motets, hymns, and secular lieder, with a focus on the motet. Early works, such as Inter natos mulierum, showcase complex mensural proportions and cantus firmus techniques influenced by Heinrich Finck. Later pieces, like the psalm motets Erzürne dich nicht über die Bösen and Herr, neige deine Ohren, reveal a shift toward imitative textures and expressive text setting, aligning with the Netherlandish style of Josquin des Prez. These German psalm motets, among the first large-scale vernacular sacred works, blend Lutheran theology with intricate polyphony.

Stoltzer’s 14 Latin and four German psalm motets are central to his legacy. They emphasize personal devotion through vivid text illustration, minimizing rigid cantus firmus structures in favor of rhetorical flexibility. His hymns, published in Georg Rhau’s 1542 collection, range from archaic chant-based settings to motet-like imitative works. Secular compositions, such as the acrostic lieder König, ein Herr ob alle Reich, reflect his courtly connections.

Stoltzer’s death in early 1526, likely by drowning in the Thaya River, cut short a career that profoundly influenced Protestant church music. His integration of German textual clarity with Franco-Flemish polyphony made his works enduring models, circulated widely into the late 16th century despite shifting musical tastes.

References:
– Lothar Hoffmann-Erbrecht, “Stoltzer, Thomas,” Grove Music Online
– “Thomas Stoltzer,” Wikipedia
– David Crook, Orlando di Lasso’s Imitation of Thomas Stoltzer (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994)

Composers of the High Renaissance Era Playlist Track

36. Herr, wie lang willt du mein so gar vergessen

Jean Richafort (b. c.1480; d. probably Bruges, c.1550) was a Franco-Flemish composer whose career spanned the late 15th and early 16th centuries, and whose music exemplifies the stylistic innovations of the High Renaissance.

Richafort’s origins are somewhat uncertain, with evidence suggesting either Hainaut or the diocese of Liège as his birthplace. He was first documented as maître du chant at St Rombout in Mechelen from 1507 to 1509, working alongside his brothers Guillaume and François. By 1509, he was succeeded by Noel Bauldeweyn. In the following decade, Richafort established connections with the French royal court, likely serving Queen Anne of Brittany and later King Louis XII, as indicated by benefice requests and dedications. By 1516, he was rector of a parish in the diocese of Nantes and a singer in the chapel of François I, and he was present in Bologna during the negotiations between François and Pope Leo X.

After 1516, Richafort’s activities are less well documented, but by 1528 he was employed as a basse-contre near Bruges. He later served as zancmeester and chaplain at St. Gilles in Bruges, holding these posts intermittently until 1550. His name appears in prominent lists of Netherlandish musicians of his generation, and his music continued to circulate widely after his death.

Richafort’s output was substantial and influential, with his works appearing in over 70 printed and 170 manuscript anthologies during the 16th century. He was highly regarded as a follower of Josquin des Prez, with Pierre de Ronsard listing him among Josquin’s “pupils.” Richafort’s music often draws directly on Josquin’s techniques, as in his motet Misereatur mei (modeled on Josquin’s Miserere mei) and his celebrated Requiem mass, which incorporates a canon on the Sarum chant Circumdederunt me-a device Josquin used in his own six-voice chanson Nymphes nappés.

His chansons display a wide stylistic range, from three-voice student pieces and arrangements to four- and five-voice works that employ both Parisian chanson elements and more complex imitative counterpoint. Notably, his five-voice chansons often feature a borrowed melody in the top voice, a style popular at the French royal court in the early 16th century.

Richafort’s motets are central to his reputation, revealing a masterful handling of form, counterpoint, and text setting. He employed a variety of structural devices, including cantus firmus, ostinato, canon, paraphrase, and imitative textures, often with sectional repetition. His motet Quem dicunt homines became a widely imitated model for parody masses by later composers, including Divitis, Mouton, Morales, and Palestrina. Richafort’s own masses, with the exception of his Requiem, are also parody masses based on his own motets, reflecting the emerging 16th-century practice of reworking existing material.

Richafort’s music is marked by its expressive depth, formal clarity, and sophisticated integration of words and music, making him a key figure in the transition from the late Josquin generation to the mature style of the High Renaissance.

References:
– Howard Mayer Brown, revised by John T. Brobeck, “Jean Richafort,” Grove Music Online
– “Jean Richafort,” Wikipedia
– M Jennifer Bloxam, “Richafort’s Requiem: beyond Josquin,” Early Music

Composers of the High Renaissance Era Playlist Track

37. De mon triste desplaisir

Philippe Verdelot (b. Verdelot, Les Loges, Seine-et-Marne, c.1480–85; d. ?Florence, ?1530–32, before 1552) was a French composer who spent most of his career in Italy and is widely recognized as one of the founders and most important early composers of the Italian madrigal.

Little is known of Verdelot’s early life, though he likely spent his formative years in northern France before moving to Italy in the early 16th century. He may have been in Venice as early as the 1510s and was certainly active in Florence from 1521, where he held prestigious posts as maestro di cappella at the Baptistery of Santa Maria del Fiore and later at the cathedral. Verdelot became deeply involved in Florentine artistic and intellectual circles, associating with figures such as Machiavelli and participating in the city’s vibrant musical and political life. His career intersected with major political upheavals, including the Medici return and the siege of Florence (1529–30); some of his motets reflect the turmoil and republican sympathies of these years.

Verdelot’s reputation rests above all on his pioneering role in the development of the madrigal. His settings-often for five or six voices-combine homophonic and imitative textures, drawing on the frottola, French chanson, and motet traditions. His style is marked by clarity of declamation, expressive use of harmony, and a balance between textual intelligibility and musical invention. While word-painting is rare, Verdelot’s music displays a keen sensitivity to poetic form and affect, and his works were widely disseminated and frequently reprinted throughout the 16th century.

Among his most famous madrigals are Madonna il tuo bel viso, Italia mia bench’il parlar, Non mai donna più bella, and Divini occhi sereni. He also set texts by Machiavelli and other prominent Florentine poets, and his madrigals were often used in theatrical and civic contexts. Verdelot’s sacred output includes about 58 motets, two extant masses-Missa Philomena and Missa La Gloria del Dixit Dominus-as well as hymns and a Magnificat sexti toni. His motets, such as Si bona suscepimus and Congregati sunt inimici nostri, show a progression from the melismatic, Mouton-like style of his early years to a more declamatory and text-driven approach in his mature works. His sacred music was widely admired and often parodied by later composers, including Arcadelt, Palestrina, and Lassus.

Verdelot’s influence on the madrigal was profound: he helped shape its musical language and expressive possibilities, and his works served as models for subsequent generations. His music continued to be performed and published well after his death, and he was praised by theorists and poets alike for his ability to unite poetic and musical expression.

References:
– H. Colin Slim, revised by Stefano La Via, ‘Philippe Verdelot’, Grove Music Online
– ‘Philippe Verdelot’, Wikipedia
Further Reading:
– Anne-Marie Bragard (ed.), Opera omnia: Philippe Verdelot (American Institute of Musicology, Corpus Mensurabilis Musicae, vols. 31–32, 1966–69)

Composers of the High Renaissance Era Playlist Track

38. Italia mia
39. O dolce notte

Benedictus Appenzeller (b. c.1480–88; d. after 1558) was a prominent South Netherlandish composer and singer, active during the first half of the 16th century and renowned for his sacred and secular vocal music. Appenzeller’s earliest documented positions were as a singer in 1518 and then choirmaster in 1519 at St Jacob in Bruges. For the next decade and a half, his activities are known primarily through the publication of his works by Attaingnant and Moderne. In 1536, he joined the chapel choir of Mary of Hungary in Brussels, and by 1537, he had become master of the choirboys-a role equivalent to maître de la chapelle, in which he remained for over 15 years. He composed many works for the Brussels chapel during this period, and his music was performed for significant court occasions.

Appenzeller’s service to Mary of Hungary continued until at least 1551, when he is last mentioned as part of her retinue traveling to Augsburg and Munich. He likely remained in her employ until her abdication in 1555, after which he became choirmaster at Ste Gudule in Brussels, a post he held until December 1558. A letter from July 1558 requesting a tax exemption gives his age as over 70, suggesting a birthdate in the 1480s. He was married to a woman named Liennaertken and is documented performing with his choirboys in ’s-Hertogenbosch in 1545.

Appenzeller’s works are sometimes confused with those of Benedictus Ducis and Benedictus de Opitiis, as many sources attribute compositions simply to “Benedictus.” However, modern scholarship has clarified the distinctions between these composers. His earliest known composition is the three-voice chanson Buvons ma comere, found in a Flemish manuscript from around 1506. His secular music is best represented by the 1542 Antwerp print Des chansons a quattre parties, which contains only his chansons. These pieces show his skill in both polyphonic and homophonic textures, sensitive text setting, and the use of refrains and repetition patterns reminiscent of earlier lyric forms.

In his sacred music, Appenzeller combined dense polyphony and modern techniques such as pervasive imitation with older features like cantus firmus, ostinato patterns, tempus perfectum, and intricate canons. His output includes masses, motets, Magnificats, and chansons, reflecting both the traditions of the late Franco-Flemish school and the evolving musical language of the mid-16th century.

References:
– Eric Jas, “Benedictus Appenzeller,” Grove Music Online
– “Benedictus Appenzeller,” Wikipedia
– Eric Jas, “Why Mary of Hungary was gifted a canon of music on a tablecloth,” Utrecht University

Mateo Flecha (b. Prades, c. 1481; d. Poblet, c. 1553) was a Spanish composer, especially renowned for his innovative ensaladas, a genre blending sacred and secular elements, languages, and musical styles. Flecha, often called “El Viejo” (the Elder) to distinguish him from his nephew, likely studied music in Barcelona with Juan Castelló. His career included appointments as cantor and later maestro de capilla at Lérida Cathedral (1522–1525), and subsequent posts at Sigüenza and in the chapel of the Infantas María and Juana of Castile at Arévalo (1544–1548). Toward the end of his life, he became a monk at the Monastery of Poblet, where he died.

Flecha’s reputation rests primarily on his ensaladas, extended polyphonic works for four or five voices that combine a variety of languages (Spanish, Catalan, Latin) and musical quotations into a vivid, episodic tapestry. These pieces were often composed for Christmas celebrations and courtly entertainment, featuring dramatic contrasts, humor, and references to both popular and learned traditions. His ensaladas were published posthumously in Prague in 1581 by his nephew, Mateo Flecha “El Joven,” and include celebrated examples such as La bomba, La guerra, El fuego, La justa, and La viuda.

In addition to ensaladas, Flecha composed villancicos (including the well-known Riu, riu, chiu), sacred Latin works such as a Miserere, and other secular and sacred songs. His music was widely disseminated and adapted by vihuelists like Valderrábano, Pisador, and Fuenllana, and was influential enough to inspire parody masses by Morales and others. Flecha’s style is marked by a seamless blend of homophonic and imitative textures, inventive use of quotation, and a unique ability to merge popular and courtly idioms.

References:
– Maricarmen Gómez, “Mateo Flecha,” Grove Music Online
– “Mateo Flecha,” Wikipedia
– “Las Ensaladas de Flecha (1 parte),” MusicaAntigua.com

Composers of the High Renaissance Era Playlist Track

40. Las Ensaladas de Flecha: El Fuego

Jacquet of Mantua (b. Vitré, 1483; d. Mantua, 2 October 1559), born Jacques Colebault, was a French composer whose distinguished career unfolded almost entirely in Italy, where he became one of the leading figures in sacred polyphony between Josquin des Prez and Palestrina.

After early years likely spent in France, Jacquet was active in Modena by 1519 as a singer for the Rangoni family and later at the Este court in Ferrara, where he formed a close association with Adrian Willaert. In 1526, he settled in Mantua, where he dominated the city’s musical life for over three decades. Granted Mantuan citizenship in 1534, he served as titular maestro di cappella at the cathedral, but his real patron was Cardinal Ercole Gonzaga, Bishop of Mantua and a prominent figure of the Counter-Reformation. Jacquet’s relationship with Gonzaga was both professional and personal, and the cardinal’s support continued even after Jacquet’s death, providing a pension for his family.

Jacquet focused almost exclusively on sacred music, responding to the religious climate and his patron’s Counter-Reformation zeal. He was highly prolific, with over 20 masses, more than 100 motets, cycles of hymns and psalms, Magnificats, Lamentations, and two Passion settings to his name. His music was widely published by leading Venetian printers, and his motet Aspice Domine became particularly famous, appearing in numerous sources and intabulations.

Stylistically, Jacquet’s early works reflect the influence of the previous generation, employing four-voice textures, voice-pairing, fauxbourdon-like progressions, and sectional structures. As his style matured, he adopted pervading imitation, fluid melodic lines, and a preference for five-voice textures, aligning with the evolving High Renaissance idiom. His masses show a progression from literal quotation of models to sophisticated variation and use of free material, while his motets range from liturgical and occasional works to tributes and courtly pieces. Jacquet’s later works, influenced by the Council of Trent, tend toward simpler, more syllabic writing for clarity of text.

Although Jacquet wrote little secular music-only a handful of chansons and madrigals survive-his sacred output was admired by theorists and composers alike, including Lanfranco, Artusi, Ruffo, Palestrina, and Lassus. His music represents a vital link in the development of Italian sacred polyphony, bridging the styles of Josquin and Palestrina and exerting a lasting influence on later generations.

References:
– George Nugent, “Jacquet of Mantua,” Grove Music Online
– “Jacquet of Mantua,” Wikipedia
– Cees Wagemakers, “Jacquet de Mantua,” Donemus
– “Jacquet of Mantua: Missa Surge Petre & motets,” Hyperion Records

Composers of the High Renaissance Era Playlist Tracks

41. Da pacem Domine
42. Missa Surge Petre: V. Agnus Dei

Martin Luther (b. Eisleben, 10 November 1483; d. Eisleben, 18 February 1546) was a German theologian, reformer, and founder of the Lutheran Church, whose influence on the course of Western Christianity was matched by his profound impact on church music.

Luther was born into a prosperous Thuringian family and was initially destined for a legal career. After studies at the University of Erfurt, he joined the Augustinian monastery there in 1505, was ordained in 1507, and soon became a professor of sacred scripture at the University of Wittenberg. His theological breakthrough-the doctrine of justification by faith alone-became the cornerstone of his reforming activity. The posting of his 95 Theses in 1517 ignited the Protestant Reformation, and his subsequent writings and actions led to his excommunication and the formation of a new church.

Unlike many other reformers, Luther gave music a central place in his vision for church and society. He was a capable singer, flutist, and lutenist, and his early musical training and appreciation for composers like Josquin des Prez and Ludwig Senfl shaped his musical ideals. Luther’s practical involvement in music was complemented by a strong understanding of music theory, as evidenced by his references to the Quadrivium and his discussions with musicians and theorists.

Luther’s reforms emphasized congregational singing in the vernacular. Beginning in the winter of 1523–24, he and his colleagues began composing, revising, and arranging hymns for the new evangelical worship. Luther personally composed the melodies for several of the most enduring chorales of the Reformation, most famously Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott (“A Mighty Fortress Is Our God”), which became a powerful symbol of Protestant identity and conviction. Other notable original melodies include Aus tiefer Not schrei ich zu dir (“From Deep Distress I Cry to You”), a paraphrase of Psalm 130, and Vom Himmel hoch, da komm ich her (“From Heaven Above to Earth I Come”), a beloved Christmas hymn. He also created Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland (“Savior of the Nations, Come”), adapting the ancient chant Veni redemptor gentium to German text, and Christ lag in Todesbanden (“Christ Jesus Lay in Death’s Strong Bands”), an Easter hymn rooted in the sequence Victimae paschali laudes. Beyond composing, Luther frequently adapted existing melodies-whether from Catholic plainchant, folk songs, or even secular tunes-through the process of contrafacta, fitting new sacred texts to familiar tunes. This pragmatic and inclusive approach reflected his conviction that “the devil should not have all the good tunes”, and it established a tradition of musical borrowing and adaptability that became a hallmark of Lutheran church music for generations.

Luther also contributed liturgical chants and worked closely with musicians such as Johann Walter, Conrad Rupsch, and music publisher Georg Rhau. He believed music was a divine gift, second only to theology, and saw it as essential for both worship and education. Luther advocated for music as a core subject in schools, insisting that schoolmasters and clergy be musically literate, and worked with colleagues like Philipp Melanchthon to integrate music into the curriculum.

Through his theology of music, his prolific hymn-writing, and his advocacy for music in both church and school, Luther established the foundation for the rich tradition of Lutheran church music-a legacy that would profoundly influence composers from Schütz to Bach and beyond.

References:
– Robin A. Leaver, “Martin Luther,” Grove Music Online
– “Martin Luther,” Wikipedia
– Robin A. Leaver, Luther’s Liturgical Music: Principles and Implications
– Christopher Boyd Brown, Singing the Gospel: Lutheran Hymns and the Success of the Reformation

Pierre Moulu (b. c.1484; d. c.1550) was a French composer active during the early 16th century, associated with Meaux Cathedral and likely the French royal court. Though documentary evidence of his life is scant, internal references in his music and papal records suggest he held clerical positions at Meaux between 1505 and 1513, and his works reveal close connections to the French royal chapel.

Moulu’s music reflects both the traditions of the late 15th century and the innovations of the early 16th. He is especially known for his five-voice chanson-motet Fiere attropos, a lament for Anne of Brittany, and the motet Mater floreat florescat, which pays tribute to a pantheon of composers from Du Fay to Josquin and lists many contemporaries linked to the French court. His works show the influence of Josquin des Prez, with whom he was said to have studied-a claim made by Pierre de Ronsard, and supported stylistically by Moulu’s use of pervasive imitation and smooth, balanced polyphony.

Among Moulu’s surviving works are five masses, the most famous being the Missa Alma Redemptoris mater. This mass is notable for its compositional ingenuity: it can be performed either as written or by omitting all rests longer than a minim, creating two distinct versions. His Missa Missus est Gabriel angelus is a parody mass based on Josquin’s motet, closely emulating Josquin’s techniques of imitation and motivic repetition. Other masses include Missa Mittit ad virginem, Missa Stephane gloriose (likely for Meaux Cathedral), and Missa Paranymphus (based on a motet by Compère).

Moulu’s chansons and motets further illustrate his transitional style. His three-voice chansons, found in Antico’s Couronne et fleur (1536), combine conservative use of borrowed melodies in the tenor with more modern sectional and poetic designs inspired by Claudin de Sermisy. His multi-voice chansons, such as those in the Livre des meslanges (Paris, 1560), favor double canons and contrapuntal complexity.

Although not widely known today, Moulu’s music was admired in his time and circulated in numerous manuscripts and prints. His works stand as a testament to the stylistic evolution of French polyphony in the generation after Josquin.

References:
– Howard Mayer Brown, revised by Richard Freedman, “Pierre Moulu,” Grove Music Online
– “Pierre Moulu,” Wikipedia
– Stephen Rice, “Moulu: Missa Alma redemptoris & Missus est Gabriel,” Hyperion Records
– Honey Meconi, “Pierre Moulu,” in Early Musical Borrowing (New York: Routledge, 2004)

Composers of the High Renaissance Era Playlist Track

43. In pace

Maistre Jhan (b. c.1485; d. October 1538) was a French composer active in Italy, best known for his long association with the Este court in Ferrara and as one of the earliest composers to cultivate the madrigal. His name appears in Ferrarese court records from 1512, and he remained in Ferrara for the rest of his life, serving for a time as maestro di cappella.

Jhan’s career at Ferrara coincided with a vibrant period of musical activity under the patronage of Alfonso I and Ercole II d’Este. Contemporary sources and theorists, including Adrianus Coclico and Vanneo, praised him as an expert composer. He was sometimes referred to as “Joannes Gallus alias Metre Jehan,” though this identification is not consistently supported in all sources, and he should not be confused with other musicians named Jean or Jan active in Italy at the time.

His sacred music, especially his motets, shows the influence of Josquin des Prez, employing pairs of imitative duos, chordal passages, and occasional metrical shifts for contrast. Jhan favored four-voice textures and syllabic text setting, with free rather than strict imitation. Many of his motets set texts in honor of saints or noble patrons, and some, like Mundi Christo, commemorate significant political events. His only surviving mass, written for the accession of Ercole II d’Este, is a large-scale cantus-firmus setting; other masses and lamentations, once attributed to him, are now lost.

Jhan was also a significant early composer of madrigals. While his madrigal style was considered archaic compared to later figures like Verdelot or Arcadelt, he is recognized as one of the founders of the genre. His madrigals appeared in early printed collections, including the first book of madrigals published under that name in 1530, and later anthologies alongside works by Verdelot, Festa, and others.

Though his music faded from prominence after his death, Maistre Jhan’s works circulated widely in manuscript and print during his lifetime, and his reputation as a skilled composer was affirmed by theorists and patrons of the period. Modern scholarship has begun to re-examine his role in the development of both sacred and secular vocal music in early 16th-century Italy.

References:
– George Nugent and James Haar, “Maistre Jhan,” Grove Music Online
– “Maistre Jhan,” Wikipedia
– Camilla Cavicchi, Maistre Jan (Brepols, 2024)

Gilles Reingot (fl. early 16th century), also known as Gillequin de Bailleul, was a South Netherlandish singer and composer active at the courts of some of the most powerful rulers of his time.

Reingot first appears in historical records as a member of the chapel of Philip the Handsome, Duke of Burgundy and King of Castile. His name is found in a payment list dated 11 October 1506, in which Queen Juana of Castile authorized payments to the singers who had accompanied her husband to Spain. By 1509, Reingot was serving as a singer in the chapel of Philip and Juana’s son, Charles-who would later become Emperor Charles V-and he continued to be associated with Charles’s musical establishment until at least 1530.

As a composer, Reingot’s surviving works are few but notable. He is credited with a four-voice setting of the Salve Regina (D-Mbs 34), which exemplifies the rich polyphonic style of the Franco-Flemish school. He also contributed to the longstanding tradition of reworking Ockeghem’s famous rondeau Fors seulement. In his four-voice setting, Reingot uses the superius of Ockeghem’s chanson as a tenor cantus firmus, weaving three fast-moving contrapuntal voices around it-a technique that demonstrates both his respect for tradition and his own compositional skill.

Although little is known about his life beyond his court service and these few compositions, Gilles Reingot’s career places him among the significant musicians who helped shape the musical culture of the Habsburg courts in the early 16th century.

References:
– Richard Sherr, ‘Gilles Reingot’, Grove Music Online
– ‘Gilles Reingot’, Wikipedia

Clément Janequin (b. Châtellerault, c.1485; d. Paris, after 1558) was a French composer of the High Renaissance, celebrated for his innovative and vividly descriptive chansons. A central figure in the development of the Parisian chanson, Janequin’s works bridged the medieval tradition of narrative song and the emerging Renaissance focus on text expression and polyphonic refinement.

Janequin’s early career unfolded in Bordeaux, where he served as a clerk to Lancelot Du Fau, a prominent ecclesiastical and political figure, from 1505 until Du Fau’s death in 1523. He later worked under Jean de Foix, Bishop of Bordeaux, and held minor church positions, though financial struggles plagued him throughout his life. By the 1530s, he relocated to Angers, serving as maître de chapelle at the cathedral and later enrolling at the University of Angers. In 1549, he settled in Paris, where he attained the prestigious title of compositeur ordinaire du roi under Henri II.

Janequin’s fame rests on his programmatic chansons, which vividly depict natural and human sounds through inventive onomatopoeia and rhythmic vitality. His best-known works include:
– La bataille (celebrating the Battle of Marignano, 1515), with trumpet calls and battle cries
– Le chant des oiseaux, imitating bird songs
– Les cris de Paris, capturing street vendors’ calls
These chansons, often sectional and texturally varied, combined popular melodies with sophisticated polyphony. Unlike his contemporary Claudin de Sermisy, Janequin favored narrative texts, repetitive motifs, and irregular cadences, creating a dynamic, mosaic-like structure.

Though primarily a composer of secular music, Janequin also wrote two masses, a motet, and over 80 chansons spirituelles (French psalm settings). His later psalm arrangements, set to Genevan melodies, suggest possible Protestant sympathies, though this remains debated. His music circulated widely through prints by Pierre Attaingnant and Jacques Moderne, ensuring his influence across Europe.

Janequin’s legacy lies in his expansion of the chanson’s expressive possibilities, blending popular appeal with artistic ingenuity. His works remained popular into the 17th century and continue to be celebrated for their wit, energy, and vivid imagery.

References:
– Howard Mayer Brown, revised by Richard Freedman, ‘Clément Janequin’, Grove Music Online
– ‘Clément Janequin’, Wikipedia
Further Reading:
– Frank Dobbins, Music in Renaissance Lyons (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1992)
– Isabelle His, ‘Janequin, Clément’, in Dictionnaire de la musique en France aux XVIe et XVIIe siècles (Paris: Fayard, 2003)

Composers of the High Renaissance Era Playlist Track

44. D’un seul soleil

Costanzo Festa (b. c. 1485–90; d. Rome, April 10, 1545) was an Italian composer and singer, recognized as one of the earliest native Italians to achieve prominence among the polyphonists of the early 16th century. For nearly three decades (1517–1545), he served as a distinguished member of the Cappella Sistina in Rome, shaping the sacred and secular music of his era.

Festa’s origins likely trace to the Piedmont region near Turin, as suggested by a papal document from 1517 referring to him as a cleric in the diocese of Turin. Before joining the papal chapel, he worked as a celebrated music teacher for the d’Avalos family on the island of Ischia and was already recognized as a composer by 1514, when he brought several motets to Ferrara.

During his tenure in Rome, Festa composed extensively for the liturgy, producing masses, Magnificat cycles, Lamentations, hymns, and numerous motets. His sacred works, such as the Missa carminum, Missa de domina nostra, and a complete set of vesper hymns, were widely used in the papal chapel and beyond. He also wrote a celebrated set of contraponti (125 instrumental variations on the tune La Spagna) and was responsible for a significant body of madrigals, contributing to the early development of the Italian madrigal genre alongside Verdelot and Pisano.

Festa’s music is characterized by clarity, contrapuntal skill, and a balance between tradition and innovation. His motets, numbering around sixty, range from simple to highly elaborate, while his madrigals display both grace and expressive depth. Although he contemplated publishing his complete works, only select madrigal collections appeared in print during his lifetime.

Bibliography
Haar, James. “Festa, Costanzo.” Grove Music Online. Oxford University Press, 2001. Accessed July 14, 2025.
“Costanzo Festa.” Wikipedia. Accessed July 14, 2025.
Main, A., and Seay, A., eds. Costanzo Festa: Opera omnia. Corpus Mensurabilis Musicae, xxv (1962–79).
Haydon, G., ed. Costanzo Festa: Hymni per totum annum. Monumenta polyphoniae italicae, iii (1958).
Agee, R.J., ed. Costanzo Festa: Counterpoints on a cantus firmus. Recent Researches in the Music of the Renaissance, cvii (1997).
Musch, M. Costanzo Festa als Madrigalkomponist. Baden-Baden, 1977.

Pierre Passereau (fl. 1509–1547) was a French composer best known for his chansons, with only a single motet in his sacred oeuvre. Although an unsubstantiated claim by Fétis suggested he was a priest at the church of St Jacques-de-la-Boucherie in Paris, recent archival research, notably from Bourges Cathedral, has provided more reliable information about his life and background.

Passereau began his career as a tenor singer in the chapel of the Duke of Angoulême (later King François I) in 1509 and may have sung at Cambrai Cathedral between 1525 and 1530. His chansons were widely printed by Pierre Attaingnant, the first royal music printer in France, possibly due to the support of François I, a noted patron of court poets and musicians.

Most of Passereau’s chansons are lively, narrative, or descriptive songs marked by graceful melodies, syllabic text settings, and a blend of freely imitative polyphony and chordal passages. His rhythmic vitality and use of repeated notes complement the rustic and sometimes earthy texts, which feature direct language and witty puns. While a few works, such as Ce fut amour, resemble the lyrical style of Claudin de Sermisy, the majority are cheerful and straightforward, reflecting the spirit of the chanson rustique.

Passereau is sometimes considered a minor master, but Attaingnant’s dedication of an entire collection to him and Clément Janequin attests to his popularity. His best-known chanson, Il est bel et bon, is famous for its onomatopoeic imitation of hens clucking and was reportedly sung in the streets of Venice. Many of his chansons were reprinted and transcribed for various instruments across Europe. Fragments of his music appear in several fricassées, and his tune Je ne seray jamais bergere was used in the farce Amoureux qui ont les botines. The satirical song Il s’est fait écosser le jonc, targeting Diane de Poitiers, features refrains that reference Passereau’s works.

References:
– Isabelle Cazeaux, ‘Pierre Passereau’, Grove Music Online
– ‘Pierre Passereau’, Wikipedia
– Gustave Reese, Music in the Renaissance (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1954)

Further Reading:
– Howard Mayer Brown, Music in the Renaissance (New York: Prentice Hall, 1976)
– Allan W. Atlas, Renaissance Music: Music in Western Europe, 1400–1600 (New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1998)

Ludwig Senfl (b. Basle or Zurich, 1489, 1490, or 1491; d. Munich, between January and March 1543) was a Swiss-born composer, singer, and copyist, recognized as one of the most influential figures in German-speaking music during the early 16th century. A pivotal figure bridging the late medieval and Renaissance eras, and active during the early Reformation, Senfl was renowned for his mastery of both sacred and secular genres and for his role in shaping the musical life of the Imperial and Bavarian courts.

Senfl’s early musical education began as a choirboy in the chapel of Emperor Maximilian I, likely joining around 1496–1498. He became the most prominent pupil and assistant of Heinrich Isaac, eventually completing Isaac’s monumental Choralis Constantinus after his teacher’s death in 1517. Senfl’s own reputation grew rapidly, and he was associated with the Imperial Hofkapelle until the death of Maximilian in 1519. After a period of travel and job-seeking, he secured a position at the Munich court under Duke Wilhelm IV, where he would remain for the rest of his life.

Senfl’s output is both extensive and diverse, encompassing Masses, cycles of Mass Propers, motets, Magnificats, and over 250 German lieder. His sacred music, including six surviving Masses and a vast repertoire of Propers for the Mass and Office, reflects both the influence of his teacher Isaac and the latest Franco-Flemish techniques, especially those of Josquin des Prez. Senfl’s motets and Magnificats are notable for their structural variety, ranging from traditional cantus firmus settings to more modern, imitative textures. His engagement with humanist circles is evident in his Latin ode settings, which were widely used in schools and intellectual circles.

Senfl’s German lieder, both sacred and secular, were central to his fame and were widely disseminated in manuscript and print. These works range from simple homophonic settings to complex contrapuntal pieces, including canons, quodlibets, and cycles. Many are based on folk melodies or popular songs, while others reflect courtly or satirical themes. His lied Das Gläut zu Speyer, which imitates the sound of church bells, and the autobiographical Lust hab ich ghabt zur Musica are particularly celebrated.

Though Senfl never openly declared for the Reformation, he maintained correspondence with Martin Luther and Duke Albrecht of Prussia and set several psalm texts that appealed to both Catholic and Protestant audiences. His music remained influential well into the later 16th century, and he was praised by theorists such as Glarean and Sebald Heyden as the leading German composer of his generation.

Senfl’s works survive in more than 360 sources, and his music continues to be performed and studied for its technical mastery, melodic invention, and historical significance.

References:
– Stefan Gasch and Sonja Tröster, ‘Ludwig Senfl’, Grove Music Online
– ‘Ludwig Senfl’, Wikipedia
– ‘Works and Sources – Ludwig Senfl’, Senfl Online
Further Reading:
– Birgit Lodes, ‘Senfl’, in Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart, Personenteil 15, cols. 569–90
– Stefan Gasch, Sonja Tröster, Birgit Lodes, Ludwig Senfl – A Catalogue Raisonné of the Works and Sources, Brepols Online

Composers of the High Renaissance Era Playlist Track

45. Das Gläut zu Speyer

Martin Agricola (born Martin Sore; b. Schwiebus [now Świebodzin, Poland], c. 1486; d. Magdeburg, June 10, 1556) was a German music theorist, teacher, and composer, and a leading figure in the development of Protestant music education and theory during the Reformation.

Agricola came from a peasant background and was largely self-taught in music, adopting the Latinized surname “Agricola” (“farmer”) to reflect his origins. By 1520 he had settled in Magdeburg, where he worked as a music teacher and, from about 1525, as choirmaster of the Protestant Lateinschule—a post he held until his death. He became one of the earliest and most influential musicians to implement Martin Luther’s vision of music as a central component of Protestant worship and education.

Agricola’s pedagogical approach was innovative for his time. He wrote his early treatises in German rather than Latin to reach a broader audience and introduced German equivalents for technical terms, some of which are still in use today. His most famous treatise, Musica instrumentalis deudsch (1529, revised 1545), provided detailed descriptions of musical instruments, guidance on playing them, and a system of notation derived from keyboard tablature that could be applied to all instruments. This work, modeled on Sebastian Virdung’s Musica getutscht (1511), was widely influential and reprinted several times.

Agricola also authored numerous other theoretical works, including Ein kurtz deutsche Musica (1528), Musica figuralis deudsch (1532), and Ein Sangbüchlein aller Sonntags Evangelien (1541)—the latter being the first collection of chorales arranged according to the church calendar, intended for congregational training.

As a composer, Agricola produced over 200 four-part music examples for his treatises, as well as motets, hymns, and odes. His Instrumentische Gesenge (published posthumously in 1561) contains 54 three- and four-part instrumental pieces designed for use in schools and homes. He also composed German chorales and Latin motets, with his settings showing the influence of Josquin des Prez and the Franco-Flemish tradition. His music is characterized by clarity, didactic purpose, and a balance between traditional and innovative techniques.

Agricola’s contributions as a theorist, educator, and composer were central to the shaping of Protestant musical life in 16th-century Germany, and his treatises remain valuable sources for the study of Renaissance musical instruments and pedagogy.

References:
– Anna Maria Busse Berger, ‘Martin Agricola’, Grove Music Online
Further Reading:
– Martin Agricola, Musica instrumentalis deudsch (Wittenberg, 1529; rev. 1545; facsimile and English translation, 1994)
– Howard Mayer Brown, Music in the Renaissance, (Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1976)

Thomas Appleby (c. 1488–1563/4) was an English church musician and composer, active during the Tudor period. He is chiefly remembered for his service as organist and Master of the Choristers at Lincoln Cathedral, as well as for his time as informator choristarum at Magdalen College, Oxford.

Appleby’s career at Lincoln Cathedral began in June 1537, when he was appointed organist and choirmaster. He left for Magdalen College, Oxford, in the autumn of 1538, where he taught the choristers until 1541. Among his pupils at Magdalen was Thomas Whythorne, who later recalled him as one of the notable musicians of the time. Appleby returned to Lincoln in the autumn of 1541 and remained there until 1550, with a later second tenure from 1559 until his death or retirement in 1563 or 1564. His whereabouts between 1550 and 1559 are not documented.

Appleby’s surviving works are limited but significant for the period. He is credited with a five-part Magnificat for men’s voices, preserved in the Peterhouse partbooks (GB-Cu Peterhouse 471–4), though the tenor part is now missing. The piece displays both moments of rough part-writing and skillful use of imitation. Another work, a Mass setting “for a mene” (for four men’s voices), is found in British Library Add.17802–5. This mass is more consistently imitative in style and includes a Kyrie intended for alternatim performance, as well as a brief Alleluia whose tenor part derives from plainsong.

Appleby’s music reflects the transition between the late medieval and early Renaissance styles in English sacred music, with a blend of older contrapuntal techniques and newer points of imitation. His career and compositions place him among the notable church musicians of mid-16th-century England.

References:
– Roger Bowers, ‘Thomas Appleby’, Grove Music Online
– ‘Thomas Appleby (composer)’, Wikipedia
Further Reading:
– Nicholas Sandon (ed.), The Peterhouse Partbooks, 4 vols. (Antico Edition, 1983–1990)
– D. Owen (ed.), A History of Lincoln Minster (Cambridge, 1994)

Georg Rhau (b. Eisfeld an der Werra, 1488; d. Wittenberg, August 6, 1548) was a German music publisher, theorist, and musician who played a foundational role in the musical life of the Lutheran Reformation.

Rhau studied at the University of Wittenberg from 1512 to 1514 and subsequently worked in the publishing house of Johann Rhau-Grunenberg, possibly a relative, before embarking on a career as a church musician and educator. In 1518, he became Kantor at the Thomaskirche and Thomasschule in Leipzig, a position he held until 1520, during which time he also lectured in music theory at the University of Leipzig.

Although no compositions by Rhau are known to survive, his tenure as Kantor and later as director of the electoral choir in Torgau (succeeding Johann Walter in 1548) indicates that he was an active performer and likely a composer. Rhau’s significance, however, lies chiefly in his work as a publisher and editor of music and musical theory.

Rhau’s publishing career was closely tied to the Lutheran Reformation. He produced numerous theological and liturgical works by leading Reformers such as Martin Luther, Philipp Melanchthon, and Johannes Bugenhagen. His music publications, which began in earnest in 1538, were designed to meet the liturgical needs of the new Protestant church. Between 1538 and 1545, he issued fifteen major collections of polyphonic music, including Masses, motets, hymns, and Vespers settings, as well as collections for educational use such as the Tricinia and Bicinia.

Rhau’s theoretical works, notably the Enchiridion utriusque musicae practicae (1517) and Enchiridion musicae mensuralis (1520), were widely used and reprinted. He also published or reissued treatises by other theorists, including Martin Agricola, Nicolaus Listenius, and Johann Spangenberg.

Rhau’s legacy is that of a central figure in the musical culture of the early Lutheran church, whose publications preserved and disseminated a rich repertoire of liturgical and educational music, blending older Franco-Flemish polyphony with the emerging styles of the German Reformation.

References:
– Victor H. Mattfeld, ‘Georg Rhau’, Grove Music Online
– ‘Georg Rhau’, Wikipedia
Further Reading:
– Robin A. Leaver, Luther’s Liturgical Music: Principles and Implications (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007)
– David Burn (ed.), Music and Theology in the European Reformations (Turnhout: Brepols, 2018/19)
– Joseph Herl, Worship Wars in Early Lutheranism: Choir, Congregation, and Three Centuries of Conflict (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004)

Gasparo Alberti (b. Padua, c. 1489; d. Bergamo, c. 1560) was an Italian composer whose career was centered at the basilica of S Maria Maggiore in Bergamo. His long association with the basilica began in 1503 when he first appears in records as a cleric. Over the years, Alberti was ordained (1514), became a chaplain (1515), and by 1536 was named maestro di cappella, a position that made him the principal composer and musical leader of the institution.

Alberti’s legacy is closely tied to his work as a copyist and composer. He compiled nine or ten choirbooks for S Maria Maggiore, beginning in 1524. Three of these composite choirbooks, mostly copied by Alberti himself, are now preserved in the Biblioteca Civica in Bergamo and constitute the main manuscript sources of his music. His influence extended to the reception of the renowned theorist Pietro Aaron at the monastery of S Leonardo in Bergamo in 1536, where Alberti organized a performance of Vespers with 22 singers using the innovative cori spezzati (divided choir) technique.

Alberti’s surviving output consists entirely of sacred vocal polyphony. His style embraces a range of approaches, from the sophisticated northern polyphony of his Mass settings to the Italian falsobordone style used in Passions, Lamentations, and litanies. His motets display both imitative and non-imitative polyphony, canon, and cantus planus, while his polychoral works employ a variety of textures and forms, including falsobordone, imitative polyphony, and the pioneering use of cori spezzati. Notably, two late Magnificat settings replace conventional block sonorities with motivic echoing between choirs. Alberti’s Passions further extend polychoral practice by assigning the turba (crowd) and vox Christi (words of Christ) to separate polyphonic groups.

Among his dated works are the Missa de Sancto Roccho (1524) and two Magnificat settings (1541, 1542). Three of his Masses were published in Venice in 1549, marking the first Italian print devoted entirely to the works of a single composer. This publication, found in libraries from Castell’Arquato to Montserrat and Munich, indicates the broad appeal of Alberti’s music. Most of his manuscript masses, motets, and Vespers music were likely completed soon after 1524, with additional Holy Week music, psalms for cori spezzati, and office music appearing by 1530. The 1530s and 1540s saw further expansion of his liturgical output, including additional Passions and Magnificat settings for cori spezzati.

Alberti is recognized for his elegant humanistic declamation, imaginative use of cantus firmus and polyphony, and innovative polychoral techniques. While he was influenced by the musical trends of his time, he also contributed significantly to the development of Italian religious music in the decades before Palestrina. His works stand as a bridge between the traditions of the early 16th century and the innovations that would define later Renaissance sacred music.

References:
– Victor Ravizza, revised by Gary Towne, ‘Gasparo Alberti’, Grove Music Online
– ‘Gasparo Alberti’, Wikipedia
Further Reading:
– Gary Towne, Gaspar de Albertis and Music at Santa Maria Maggiore in Bergamo in the Sixteenth Century (PhD diss., University of California, Santa Barbara, 1987)
– Richard Sherr (ed.), The Josquin Companion (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000)
– Iain Fenlon, Music and Patronage in Sixteenth-Century Mantua, Vol. 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980)

Nicholas Ludford (c.1490; bur. Westminster, 9 August 1557) was an English composer renowned for his innovative and prolific contributions to early Tudor church music. Although little is known about his early life and musical training, Ludford is believed to have been born in London and was associated for most of his career with the royal chapel of St Stephen’s, Westminster.

Ludford’s earliest documented connection to Westminster is from 1517, when he rented lodgings from the Abbey. By the early 1520s, he was attached to St Stephen’s, where he was formally appointed verger in 1527-a post that, while administrative, also involved significant musical responsibilities, including organ playing and possibly the supervision of chapel music. He remained at St Stephen’s until its dissolution in 1547, after which he continued to serve as churchwarden at St Margaret’s, Westminster. Ludford appears to have remained a committed Catholic throughout his life, and there is no evidence he composed for the reformed Anglican church.

Ludford’s surviving works are preserved in major early Tudor choirbooks, notably the Caius and Lambeth Choirbooks, and in partbooks such as those for his unique cycle of Lady Masses. He is the most prolific composer of masses from pre-Reformation England, with at least seventeen attributed to him, including fragmentary and lost works. His two six-part festal masses, Missa Videte miraculum and Missa Benedicta et venerabilis, exemplify his rich, sonorous writing and innovative use of vocal textures, including paired treble and bass parts. The Missa Benedicta et venerabilis is particularly notable for its Magnificat, which uniquely incorporates an independent plainchant melody.

Ludford’s seven three-part Lady Masses constitute the only complete weekly cycle of such settings known from Tudor England. These masses, likely intended for the royal household of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon, combine florid polyphony with sections of plainchant and demonstrate Ludford’s mastery of both traditional and evolving musical forms. His style bridges the lush harmonies of Robert Fayrfax and the more modern approaches of John Taverner, marked by melodic abundance, imaginative texture, and contrapuntal skill.

Though his music fell into obscurity after the Reformation, Ludford is now recognized as a central figure in Tudor polyphony, whose works provide a vital link in the development of English sacred music.

References:
– David Skinner, “Nicholas Ludford,” Grove Music Online
– “Nicholas Ludford,” Wikipedia
– Dr. John Cooper “Sacred Music and St Stephen’s: Listening to Ludford,” Virtual St Stephen’s
– Tate Pumfrey “Nicholas Ludford: A Forgotten Master of English Polyphony,” Catholic Insight

Sandrin (c. 1490–after 1561), born Pierre Regnault, was a French composer celebrated for his chansons during the mid-16th century. His sobriquet “Sandrin” likely derives from a farce character known for responding to questions with the first few words of chansons. Active in France and Italy, his works epitomize the transition from the Parisian chanson style to Italian-influenced Renaissance practices.

Sandrin’s early career included service as a choirboy at the French royal court (1506) and later as a singer for Louise de Savoy (1517). After a period possibly spent acting, he rejoined the royal chapel by 1539, earning recognition alongside Claudin de Sermisy. By the 1550s, he served as maestro di cappella for Cardinal Ippolito d’Este in Siena, blending French and Italian musical idioms. He last appears in records in 1561, likely dying in Italy.

Of his 50 surviving chansons and one madrigal, Doulce memoire became a Renaissance phenomenon, widely reprinted and arranged for instruments. His early chansons, like those of Sermisy, feature homophonic textures with subtle counterpoint and repetitive phrasing. Later works, such as Amour si haut, incorporate madrigal-like word-painting, chromaticism, and rhythmic flexibility influenced by his Italian tenure. Despite his sacred appointments, no liturgical works survive.

Sandrin’s legacy lies in his melodic elegance and adaptability. Doulce memoire inspired countless arrangements, including Diego Ortiz’s improvisation exercises, and parody masses by composers like Palestrina. While overshadowed by contemporaries, his music exemplifies the cosmopolitan exchange between French and Italian Renaissance traditions.

References:
Howard Mayer Brown, revised by John T. Brobeck, ‘Sandrin’, Grove Music Online
‘Sandrin’, Wikipedia
Frank Dobbins, ‘“Doulce mémoire”: a Study of the Parody Chanson‘, PRMA (1969–70)
Further Reading:
Christelle Cazaux, La musique à la cour de François Ier (Paris, 2002)
H.M. Brown: Music in the French Secular Theater, 1400–1550 (Cambridge, MA, 1963), 62–3
H. Vanhulst: ‘Un success de l’édition musicale: le “Septiesme livre des chansons a quatre parties” (1560-1661/3)’, RBM, 32 (1978–79), 97–120

Composers of the High Renaissance Era Playlist Track

46. Doulce memoire en plaisir consommée

Claudin de Sermisy (c. 1490–1562) was a leading French composer of the Renaissance, celebrated for his chansons and sacred music, and a central figure in the musical life of the French royal court under several monarchs. His name appears in most contemporary publications simply as “Claudin,” marking his prominence among his peers.

Born possibly in the region around Noyon in Picardy, Sermisy began his career as a singer and cleric at the Sainte-Chapelle in Paris in 1508. He later joined the private chapel of Queen Anne of Brittany and, after her death, became a member of the royal chapel under King Louis XII and King François I. Sermisy almost certainly accompanied François I to Italy in 1515, participating in joint musical performances with the papal choir during the Concordat of Bologna. He received ecclesiastical honors and benefices throughout his life, including a canonicate at Notre-Dame-de-la-Ronde in Rouen and a canonry at the Sainte-Chapelle, which he held until his death.

Sermisy was renowned for his chansons, which exemplify the “Parisian” chanson style: tuneful, homophonic, and sensitive to text, with clear phrasing and elegant melodies. He set many poems by contemporary poets, especially Clément Marot, and his works were widely reprinted and arranged for instruments across Europe. His secular output is notable for its lyrical quality and expressive simplicity, often setting poems on the theme of unhappy love, though he also composed drinking songs, animal songs, and other popular types. Sermisy’s chansons were frequently transcribed for lute, keyboard, and other instruments, and some became models for parody masses by other composers.

In sacred music, Sermisy was equally prolific, composing 13 masses, over 78 motets, and numerous liturgical pieces. His sacred works, published by Pierre Attaingnant and others, are characterized by clear text presentation, consonant harmonies, and a preference for homophonic textures, reflecting the influence of the chanson style on his liturgical writing. Sermisy’s motets and masses often employ imitation techniques and plainchant cantus firmi, but his approach is consistently lucid and tuneful, with a focus on clarity and expressive text setting. His Magnificat settings, published in 1548–49, are especially significant for their use of falsobordone and alternatim techniques.

Sermisy’s reputation among his contemporaries was exceptional. He was praised by fellow musicians and poets, and his music was admired both in France and abroad. After his death, he was commemorated in a déploration by Pierre Certon, who called him “grand maistre, expert et magnificque compositeur.” Though his fame faded somewhat after his lifetime, modern scholarship recognizes Sermisy as a key figure in the development of French Renaissance music and a “veritable dean of French musical life” in the second quarter of the 16th century.

References:
Isabelle Cazeaux, revised by John T. Brobeck, ‘Claudin de Sermisy’, Grove Music Online
‘Claudin de Sermisy’, Wikipedia
Gustave Reese, Music in the Renaissance (New York: W.W. Norton, 1954)
Further Reading:
Isabelle Cazeaux, French Music in the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries (Oxford and New York, 1975)
Christelle Cazaux, La musique à la cour de François Ier (Paris, 2002)
L. Bernstein, ‘The “Parisian Chanson”: Problems of Style and Terminology‘, JAMS 31 (1978), 193–240

47. Tant que vivray

Adrian Willaert (c. 1490–1562), a Flemish composer active primarily in Italy, stands as one of the most influential figures of the High Renaissance, renowned for shaping the musical language of Venice and much of northern Italy. Born either in Bruges or Roeselare, Willaert initially studied law in Paris but soon devoted himself to music under the tutelage of Jean Mouton, a leading composer at the French royal court.

Willaert’s early career took him to Rome and then to the service of Cardinal Ippolito I d’Este in Ferrara, where he became known as “Adriano Cantore.” He likely accompanied the cardinal on travels, including a period in Hungary, before returning to Ferrara and later serving the Este family in Milan. In 1527, he was appointed maestro di cappella at St. Mark’s Basilica in Venice, a post he held with distinction until his death in 1562. The Venetian Doge Andrea Gritti played a key role in his appointment, recognizing Willaert’s potential to elevate the musical standards of the city.

At St. Mark’s, Willaert reformed and expanded the chapel, attracting musicians from across Europe and establishing Venice as a leading center for musical innovation. He was highly regarded as a teacher, instructing a generation of composers who would define the Venetian School, including Cipriano de Rore, Gioseffo Zarlino, and Andrea Gabrieli. Willaert’s influence extended beyond his immediate circle, as his students disseminated his ideas throughout Italy and the rest of Europe.

Willaert’s compositional output is vast and varied, encompassing masses, motets, hymns, psalms, madrigals, chansons, and instrumental ricercares. He is particularly celebrated for his motets, which number over 170 and were widely circulated during his lifetime. His sacred works are noted for their sophisticated counterpoint, expressive text setting, and innovative use of antiphonal effects, especially in polychoral psalm settings for the unique acoustics of St. Mark’s. Willaert’s Musica nova (1559), a monumental collection of motets and madrigals, is considered a landmark of Renaissance polyphony, admired for its technical mastery and emotional depth.

In secular music, Willaert made significant contributions to the development of the Italian madrigal, adapting the Franco-Flemish polyphonic style to Italian poetic forms. His madrigals, especially those in Musica nova, are praised for their sensitive treatment of text and inventive musical structures. He also composed chansons in the French style and pioneered the canzone villanesca, a popular genre of Italian dialect song.

Willaert’s instrumental works, particularly his ricercares, played a foundational role in the development of the imitative instrumental style that would become central to later Renaissance and Baroque music. His legacy as both composer and teacher ensured that his innovations in harmony, counterpoint, and text setting influenced generations of musicians, making him a pivotal figure in the transition from Renaissance to Baroque styles.

References:
Lewis Lockwood, Michele Fromson, Jessie Ann Owens, revised by Giulio Ongaro, ‘Adrian Willaert’, Grove Music Online
‘Adrian Willaert’, Wikipedia
Further Reading:
I. Bossuyt, Adriaan Willaert, ca. 1490–1562: Leven en werk: Stijl en genres (Leuven: Universitaire Pers Leuven, 1985)
G.M. Ongaro, The Chapel of St. Mark’s at the Time of Adrian Willaert (1527–1562) (Ann Arbor: UMI, 1987)
Bradley Leonard Almquist, “Adrian Willaert’s ‘Musica Nova’: Selected Motets: Editions and Commentary” (Dissertation, Louisiana State University, 1993)

Composers of the High Renaissance Era Playlist Tracks

48. Faulte d’argent (chanson for 6 voices)
49. Le vecchie per invidia (canzona for 4 voices)

Francesco de Layolle (1492–c. 1540) was an Italian composer and organist whose career bridged the musical traditions of Florence and Lyons during the High Renaissance. Renowned for blending Franco-Flemish polyphony with Italian harmonic innovation, he played a key role in the stylistic evolution leading to later Renaissance masters like Palestrina.

Born in Florence, Layolle began his musical journey as a choirboy at the SS. Annunziata church, studying under Bartolomeo degli Organi, a prominent Medici court composer. His marriage to Maddalena Arrighi, sister-in-law of his mentor, solidified his ties to Florence’s artistic circles. A portrait by Andrea del Sarto (1511) places him among intellectuals like poet Luigi Alamanni, reflecting his integration into Renaissance cultural life. In 1521, he relocated to Lyons, where he served as organist at Notre Dame de Confort and collaborated with printer Jacques Moderne, producing influential sacred and secular collections.

Layolle’s legacy is marked by his synthesis of contrapuntal techniques and Italian lyricism. His sacred works include three surviving masses—Missa ‘Adieu mes amours’, Missa ‘O salutaris hostia’, and Missa ‘Ces fascheux sotz’—which employ parody and cantus firmus methods. The motet Noe, noe, noe exemplifies his melodic grace, while Ave Maria showcases canon techniques. His secular output includes madrigals (published as canzoni) such as Lasciar il velo, popularized in lute arrangements, and French chansons like Ce me semblent, reflecting the Parisian style of Claudin de Sermisy.

Though much of his music is lost—including 61 motets and three masses cited in historical catalogs—his extant works reveal a composer adept at merging structural complexity with expressive clarity. A friend to Florentine republicans, Layolle sheltered political exiles in Lyons but avoided direct censure, allowing him to thrive as a central figure in the city’s artistic community until his death around 1540.

References:
Frank A. D’Accone, ‘Francesco de Layolle’, Grove Music Online
‘Francesco de Layolle’, Wikipedia
‘Francesco de Layolle’, The Kennedy Center
Further Reading:
David Sutherland, Francesco de Layolle (1492–1540): Life and Secular Works (Ann Arbor: UMI, 1968)

Lupus Hellinck (also Wulfaert; b. Axel, c. 1493/94; d. Bruges, c. 14 January 1541) was a Flemish composer of the Renaissance, recognized for his mastery of sacred polyphony and his subtle engagement with the religious currents of his time. Raised in Bruges, Hellinck began his musical training as a choirboy at St. Donatian in 1506. After his voice changed, he pursued further studies and returned to Bruges as a cleric in 1513. By 1515, he left for Rome, where he served in the papal household and was ordained a priest. He spent time in Ferrara in the service of Sigismondo d’Este before returning to Bruges in 1519, where he held positions at both St. Donatian and the Church of Our Lady, eventually becoming succentor at St. Donatian in 1523, a post he held until his death.

Hellinck’s compositional output includes masses, motets, German chorales, French chansons, and Dutch songs. He is especially noted for his fourteen parody masses, which display a remarkable unity of style and structure. Rather than quoting large sections from his models, Hellinck preferred to develop new contrapuntal combinations from thematic material, often drawing on his own motets. His masses are characterized by thematic repetition, motivic development, and the use of self-borrowing, particularly in the Agnus Dei sections, which often serve as reflective codas. The Missa In te Domine speravi is unique among his masses for its newly composed Agnus Dei.

His motets, such as In te Domine speravi, Panis quem ego dabo, and two settings of the Miserere, are admired for their expressive depth and contrapuntal skill. Several of these works are thought to reflect sympathy for the Protestant Reformation, especially those inspired by the prison writings of Girolamo Savonarola. Hellinck’s later works include eleven German chorales in motet style, with the chorale tune typically in the tenor, further suggesting his openness to reformist ideas despite his lifelong Catholic faith.

Stylistically, Hellinck’s music is marked by clear tonal organization, balanced formal structures, and a preference for pervading imitation over cantus firmus or canon. His textures are generally dense, with smooth dissonance treatment and a fine sense of melodic variety. In his secular works, he composed chansons and Flemish songs, though these are less numerous than his sacred output.

Hellinck’s influence extended beyond his lifetime, with his music published and copied across Europe. His works were sometimes confused with those of contemporaries such as Johannes Lupi, but modern scholarship has clarified his distinctive voice. Today, Hellinck is recognized as a significant figure in the transition from Josquin’s generation to the later 16th-century polyphonists, and as a composer whose music bridges the worlds of Catholic tradition and Reformation innovation.

Bibliography
Blackburn, Bonnie J. “Hellinck, Lupus.” Grove Music Online. Oxford University Press, 2001. Accessed July 3, 2025.
“Lupus Hellinck.” Wikipedia. Accessed July 3, 2025.
Blackburn, Bonnie J. Lupus Hellinck: Three Four-Part Masses. Exempla Musica Zelandica, ix. Middelburg, 2016.
J. Graziano. “Lupus Hellinck: a Survey of Fourteen Masses.” Musical Quarterly 56 (1970): 247–69.

Pierre Attaingnant (b. probably in or near Douai, c. 1494; d. Paris, late 1551 or 1552) was a pioneering French music printer, publisher, bookseller, and type designer, whose innovations transformed the production and dissemination of music in Renaissance Europe. Attaingnant’s early career in Paris included an apprenticeship with the printer-engraver Philippe Pigouchet, whose daughter Claude he married, thus inheriting Pigouchet’s business. By 1513/14, Attaingnant was already active as a bookseller, and his first known publication—a Noyon breviary—appeared in 1525.

Attaingnant’s most significant contribution was the development and popularization of single-impression music printing, a technique that allowed staff lines and notes to be printed in one pass. This method, first used in his Chansons nouvelles of 1528, dramatically reduced the cost and complexity of music printing compared to the earlier multi-impression processes. The efficiency and affordability of Attaingnant’s approach made mass production of music books possible for the first time, and his workshop’s output quickly became the standard across Europe.

Over his career, Attaingnant published an extraordinary range of music, including chansons, masses, motets, hymns, lute tablatures, and keyboard scores. He was instrumental in promoting the Parisian chanson, featuring composers such as Claudin de Sermisy, Clément Janequin, and Pierre Certon. His catalog also included works by Franco-Flemish masters like Gombert, Lupi, Richafort, Arcadelt, Verdelot, and Willaert. Attaingnant’s publications were often protected by royal privilege, and in 1537 he was appointed imprimeur et libraire du Roy en musique, the first official royal music printer in France.

Attaingnant’s business acumen extended to editing and marketing: he offered practical features such as indexes listing voice combinations and instrumental indications, and he was among the first to publish arrangements of four-voice chansons for two or three voices. His press runs were large for the time, with some chanson volumes reaching 1,000 copies and multiple editions. Through partnerships and family connections, he established a distribution network that reached well beyond France.

Although not a composer himself, Attaingnant’s editorial standards were generally high, and he played a crucial role in shaping the musical tastes of his era. After his death, his widow and son-in-law continued the business for a time, but the royal privilege eventually passed to Le Roy & Ballard, who succeeded him as the leading music printers in Paris.

Attaingnant’s legacy lies in his technical innovation, his role in the rise of the Parisian chanson, and his influence on the centralization and commercialization of French musical life. His methods and business model set the template for music publishing in the centuries that followed.

Bibliography
Heartz, Daniel, revised by Laurent Guillo. “Attaingnant, Pierre.” Grove Music Online. Oxford University Press, 2001. Accessed July 3, 2025.
“Pierre Attaingnant.” Wikipedia. Accessed July 3, 2025.
Heartz, Daniel. Pierre Attaingnant, Royal Printer of Music: A Historical Study and Bibliographical Catalogue. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1969.
Guillo, Laurent. Les éditions musicales de la Renaissance lyonnaise. Paris: Klincksieck, 1991.
Bernstein, Lawrence F. “The ‘Parisian chanson’: Problems of Style and Terminology.” Journal of the American Musicological Society 31 (1978): 193–240.

Leonhard Kleber (c. 1495–4 March 1556) was a German organist, arranger, and teacher, recognized for his pivotal role in the early development of organ music and for compiling one of the largest and most significant organ tablatures of the Renaissance. Born in Göppingen (Wiesensteig), Kleber studied at Heidelberg University, matriculating in 1512, and is believed to have been influenced by, or possibly studied with, the renowned blind organist Arnolt Schlick. His early career included posts as vicar-choral and organist in Horb am Neckar (1516–17) and as organist in Esslingen am Neckar (1517–21), where he had access to a celebrated new organ.

In 1521, Kleber was appointed organist at the collegiate and parish church of St. Michael in Pforzheim, a position he held for the rest of his life. He also received a benefice at the hospital church in Baden-Baden in 1541, thanks to the Margrave of Baden. Kleber was a highly sought-after teacher, with at least sixteen named pupils recorded by 1524, and he achieved considerable prosperity, owning his own house in Pforzheim.

Kleber’s enduring legacy is the monumental organ tablature he compiled between 1521 and 1524 in Pforzheim. This 332-page manuscript contains 112 pieces, most of which are arrangements of vocal works by leading composers of the time, including Josquin des Prez, Heinrich Isaac, Jacob Obrecht, Antoine Brumel, Paul Hofhaimer, Ludwig Senfl, and others. The collection features both sacred and secular music—settings of masses, motets, hymns, antiphons, sequences, songs, dances, and chansons—demonstrating the breadth of the early 16th-century repertory. The first section of the tablature is for manual performance only, while the second includes pieces requiring pedal, a system likely inspired by Schlick.

Although only a few pieces in the tablature can be identified as original compositions, and most are adaptations of vocal models, the manuscript is historically significant for its documentation of the south-west German organ and keyboard style at the dawn of the Reformation. The free compositions in the collection, in particular, offer insight into the early stages of independent instrumental music. It hasn’t been determined if Kleber composed any of the free compositions. Kleber’s method of adaptation and his selection of repertoire reflect his close connections with other prominent organists and arrangers of his era, such as Paul Hofhaimer, Hans Buchner, Hans Kotter, and Fridolin Sicher.

Bibliography
Schuler, Manfred. “Kleber, Leonhard.” Grove Music Online. Oxford University Press, 2001. Accessed July 3, 2025.
“Leonhard Kleber.” Wikipedia. Accessed July 3, 2025.
Loewenfeld, H. Leonhard Kleber und sein Orgeltabulaturbuch als Beitrag zur Geschichte der Orgelmusik im beginnenden XVI. Jahrhundert. Berlin, 1897.

Pierre Vermont [l’aîné, Vermont primus, Vermond seniorem] (b. c. 1495; d. before February 22, 1533) was a French composer and singer of the Renaissance, closely associated with the Sainte-Chapelle in Paris. Possibly related to Pernot Vermont, Pierre’s career is well documented and stands apart for its length and influence within the royal musical establishment.

Vermont began his musical life as one of six choirboys in the maîtrise of the Sainte-Chapelle in 1510, performing treble parts for the itinerant royal chapels of the French kings. By 1511, he left the choir to pursue further education at the Collège de Navarre, funded by the crown, but returned the following year as a lower cleric, participating in the daily liturgy. Sometime between 1521 and 1525, Vermont became music master of the Sainte-Chapelle’s maîtrise, a role that involved frequent travel with the royal chapel. In 1525, he was granted the chantry of St Quiriace de Provins by Louise de Savoy, and from that time he sang basse-contre for the royal chapel, a position he held until his death.

Twelve works are securely attributed to Pierre Vermont, including seven motets and five chansons. His motets, some for four and others for five voices, are notable for their pervasive imitation and, in two cases, the use of a tenor cantus firmus with a separate text—an archaic feature by the early 16th century. Vermont’s motets display long, winding melodies and little textural contrast, setting them apart from the more transparent style of Parisian contemporaries like Claudin de Sermisy or Pierre Certon. His chansons, all for four voices, also favor imitative textures and are more contrapuntal than the homophonic chansons typical of the period.

Vermont’s music was published and circulated during his lifetime, with his chansons appearing in print by 1533. He was recognized by contemporaries for his musical skill; François Rabelais (c. 1483-1553) mentions Vermont in the prologue to Book IV of Gargantua and Pantagruel as one of the most renowned singers of the age. Although one motet formerly attributed to him (Ave virgo gloriosa O clemens o pia) is now credited to Jacquet of Mantua, the remaining works are considered authentic.

Bibliography
Brobeck, John T. “Vermont, Pierre.” Grove Music Online. Oxford University Press, 2001. Accessed July 4, 2025.
“Pierre Vermont.” Wikipedia. Accessed July 4, 2025.
Smijers, A., and A.T. Merritt, eds. Treize livres de motets parus chez Pierre Attaingnant en 1534 et 1535. Paris and Monaco, 1934–63.
Reese, Gustave. Music in the Renaissance. New York: W.W. Norton, 1954.
Rabelais, François. Gargantua and Pantagruel, Book IV (tr. J.M. Cohen). Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1963.

Lorenz Lemlin (also Lemblin, Lemlein; b. Eichstätt, c. 1495; d. after 1549) was a German composer, Kapellmeister, and influential teacher active during the first half of the 16th century. Lemlin likely received his early musical education at the cathedral school in Eichstätt under Kapellmeister Bernhard Adelmann. He entered Heidelberg University in 1513 and earned his bachelor’s degree in 1514. Ordained as a priest, Lemlin spent most of his professional life at the Heidelberg court chapel, eventually serving as Kapellmeister under Elector Ludwig V.

Lemlin was the central figure among the so-called Heidelberger Liedmeister, a group of song composers and choirboys who maintained close ties throughout their careers. Notable pupils included Jobst vom Brandt, Georg Forster, Caspar Othmayr, and Stephan Zirler. Forster, in particular, published many of Lemlin’s songs in his influential collection Frische teutsche Liedlein and dedicated the 1549 volume to his former teacher.

Although Lemlin’s compositional output was relatively modest and did not define a unified school style, his works were valued for their craftsmanship and pedagogical influence. Fifteen secular songs survive, characterized by conservative imitative pairings and a rigid cantus firmus technique, reflecting the influence of earlier masters like Paul Hofhaimer and Heinrich Finck. His most famous piece, the six-voice Der Gutzgauch auf dem Zaune saß, is notable for its playful imitation of the cuckoo’s call, capturing the spirit of a true folksong.

Lemlin’s sacred music consists of motets that are more homophonic and concise, showing the impact of humanist ode composition and the evolving style of the late Netherlandish composers. His motets include works such as Converte nos Deus, Deus adiuva me, Grates nunc omnes, and Memento mei, with settings for two to eight voices.

Bibliography
Hoffmann-Erbrecht, Lothar. “Lemlin, Lorenz.” Grove Music Online. Oxford University Press, 2001. Accessed July 4, 2025.
“Lorenz Lemlin.” Wikipedia. Accessed July 4, 2025.
C.P. Reinhardt. Die Heidelberger Liedmeister des 16. Jahrhunderts. Kassel, 1939.
G. Pietzsch. Quellen und Forschungen zur Geschichte der Musik am kurpfälzischen Hof zu Heidelberg bis 1622. Mainz, 1963.

Leonhard Päminger (also Paminger, Panninger; b. Aschach an der Donau, March 25, 1495; d. Passau, May 3, 1567) was an Austrian composer, poet, theologian, and educator, recognized as a leading figure in early Lutheran music and intellectual life in Reformation-era Germany and Austria.

Päminger received a humanist education in Vienna from 1505, matriculating at the university in 1513 and supporting himself as a bass in the Stadtkantorei of St. Stephen’s Cathedral. Largely self-taught as a composer, he moved to Passau in 1516, where he became schoolmaster at St. Nikola and later Rektor in 1529. After adopting Lutheran beliefs, he lost his position as Rektor in 1557 but remained as secretary until his death. Päminger was closely connected to leading Reformation thinkers, including Martin Luther and Philipp Melanchthon, and was highly regarded by his contemporaries as a composer and author. Three of his sons—Balthasar, Sophonias, and Sigismund—were also active as writers and composers.

Päminger’s output is remarkable for its breadth and volume, with more than 700 surviving works. He was internationally recognized early in his career, with his music appearing in French and Italian anthologies. His compositions are primarily sacred, including Latin antiphons, responsories, psalms, hymns, Propers, and German Protestant hymns. His most distinctive works are cantus firmus motets, which alternate passages of free counterpoint with imitative polyphony and sometimes employ paired imitation, anticipating later cori spezzati techniques. Päminger’s technical skill is evident in works such as the 16-voice canon In profunditatem and the double crab canon Vexilla regis prodeunt. He also wrote motets incorporating quodlibet techniques.

Päminger’s sacred music reflects both Catholic and Lutheran traditions, with settings of introits, alleluias, sequences, and prosae. He often replaced Latin texts with German, underscoring his commitment to the Reformation. Four volumes of his projected ten-volume edition of Protestant hymns were published posthumously, containing over 680 works; the remaining six volumes, which were to include masses, Magnificats, biblical stories, and bicinia, are lost.

In addition to his musical achievements, Päminger was a prolific poet, theologian, and translator. He corresponded with major Reformation figures and wrote treatises on theological controversies of his day. His legacy is that of a bridge between the Franco-Flemish polyphonic tradition and the emerging Lutheran musical style, with a distinctive voice that combined technical mastery, humanist learning, and confessional commitment.

Bibliography
Wessely, Othmar, revised by Walter Kreyszig. “Paminger [Päminger, Panninger], Leonhard.” Grove Music Online. Oxford University Press, 2001. Accessed July 5, 2025.
“Leonhard Päminger.” Wikipedia. Accessed July 5, 2025.
Roth, I. Leonhard Paminger: ein Beitrag zur deutschen Musikgeschichte des 16. Jahrhunderts. Munich, 1935.
G. Pätzig, “Das Chorbuch Mus. ms. 40024 der Deutschen Staatsbibliothek Berlin: eine wichtige Quelle zum Schaffen Isaacs aus der Hand Leonhard Pämingers,” in Festschrift Walter Gestenberg, ed. G. von Dadelsen and A. Holschneider (Wolfenbüttel, 1964), 122–42.
C. Meyer, “Vexilla regis prodeunt: un canon énigmatique de Leonhard Paminger,” in Festschrift Christoph-Hellmut Mahling, ed. A. Beer, K. Pfarr and W. Ruf (Tutzing, 1977), 909–17.

Nicolas Gombert (c. 1495–c. 1560) was a South Netherlandish composer whose music marks the culmination of Renaissance polyphonic style. Renowned for his mastery of dense, imitative counterpoint, Gombert’s works were central to the musical life of the Habsburg court and exerted a lasting influence on both sacred and secular music across Europe.

Born likely in southern Flanders, possibly in La Gorgue, Gombert is said by the theorist Hermann Finck (1527 – 1558) to have studied with Josquin des Prez, and he composed a notable déploration on Josquin’s death. By 1526, Gombert was a singer in Emperor Charles V’s chapel, rising to maître des enfants (director of the choirboys) in 1529. He traveled extensively with the imperial chapel—visiting Flanders, Spain, Italy, Austria, and Germany—and held ecclesiastical benefices in several cities. By 1534, he was appointed canon of Tournai Cathedral, where he likely spent his final years.

Gombert’s career at court ended abruptly around 1540, reportedly due to inappropriate conduct with a boy in the emperor’s service for which he was sentenced to the galleys. According to Jerome Cardan, Gombert composed a series of “swan songs” during his exile—possibly the late Magnificat settings—which led to his pardon and eventual retirement. The last documented activity is a 1547 letter from Tournai, and by the mid-1560s he was presumed dead.

Gombert’s reputation rests on his innovative approach to polyphony. Finck praised him as the leading figure of a new, refined style, characterized by pervasive imitation and overlapping phrases that create a seamless, richly textured sound. Each phrase of text is set to its own motif, taken up in close succession by the voices, resulting in equality among parts and a continuous, flowing texture. Gombert favored five- or six-voice scoring, with a preference for lower ranges, yielding a dark, resonant sonority reminiscent of Ockeghem. His rhythmic style is generally simple but enlivened by syncopation and cross-accents, and his melodies are shaped by syllabic text setting and subtle motivic variation.

His sacred output includes ten surviving masses—most of them parody masses based on motets or chansons—and over 160 motets, many of which draw on scriptural texts or Marian themes. The motets, considered his most representative works, exhibit a two-part structure and motivic unity, with expressive melodic invention and careful, if sometimes secondary, attention to text declamation. Techniques such as ostinato, canon, and cantus firmus are rare, but he occasionally employs them for symbolic effect, as in Musae Jovis, his tribute to Josquin. Gombert’s eight Magnificat settings, one for each church mode, are among his finest achievements, featuring alternatim settings that blend plainsong with intricate polyphony.

Gombert’s secular music comprises more than 70 chansons, which share the dense, imitative texture of his sacred works but are often more animated and occasionally lighter in style, approaching the Parisian chanson. The texts, often anonymous and drawn from older or folkish verse, typically explore themes of love and loss. His chansons were widely disseminated, frequently arranged for lute and vihuela, and enjoyed immense popularity.

Contemporaries ranked Gombert among the greatest composers of his age. His works were widely published, with Venetian printers issuing collected editions of his motets. Admired by theorists and musicians alike, his style influenced Morales, Jacquet of Mantua, Clemens non Papa, and Lassus, among others. Although the next generation moved toward a clearer, more text-oriented style, Gombert’s contrapuntal techniques lived on in instrumental forms such as the ricercare and, ultimately, the fugue.

Bibliography
Nugent, George, and Eric Jas. “Gombert, Nicolas.” Grove Music Online. Oxford University Press, 2001. Accessed July 5, 2025.
Lorenz, Ian. “Style and Process in the Magnificat Cycle of Nicolas Gombert.” Academia.edu. Accessed July 5, 2025.
“Nicolas Gombert.” Wikipedia. Accessed July 5, 2025.

Composers of the High Renaissance Era Playlist Tracks

50. Ave Maria
51. Missa Tempore paschali: Agnus Dei

Johann Walter (b. Kahla, Thuringia, 1496; d. Torgau, March 25, 1570) was a German composer, poet, and a principal architect of Lutheran church music in the early Reformation. Born Johann Blanckenmüller, he was adopted by a citizen of Kahla and studied under the name Johann Walter. Having likely served as a choirboy in Kahla and Rochlitz, he became a bass singer with the Hofkapelle of the Elector of Saxony from 1521 to 1525. After the death of Friedrich III, Walter worked closely with Martin Luther in Wittenberg, securing support for the continued cultivation of sacred music and leading the formation of the Protestant Kantorei.

Walter’s long association with Torgau saw him appointed to various civic and ecclesiastical roles, including vicar, music teacher, and director of the parish music. In 1535 he received an annual grant to establish a new Kantorei (choir) and oversaw performances of elaborate repertory at occasions such as the dedication of the renovated Schlosskapelle in 1544. Following changes in electoral patronage after the Schmalkaldic War, Walter relocated to Dresden, where he directed the Hofkapelle until his retirement in 1554, subsequently returning to Torgau.

Walter was a staunch Lutheran, resisting both the Leipzig Interim and any attempts at theological or liturgical innovation in later years. His relationship with Luther was central to his legacy: Walter’s Geystliches gesangk Buchleyn (Wittenberg, 1524) was the first Lutheran choral collection and figured prominently in the spread of the Protestant hymn. Prefaced by Luther himself, the collection offered robust polyphonic arrangements for young musicians, demonstrating Walter’s command of the Tenorlied and his vision for congregational singing. Its broad success is recorded in numerous editions and contemporary accounts.

Walter continued to write, revise, and organize church music, including the influential Torgau Walter Manuscripts. He enriched the repertory with his German hymn settings—marked by their thirds, sixths, and simple contrapuntal style—as well as more ambitious pieces for up to seven voices and collections of Magnificat settings. His works also include Latin masses, motets, Passions, and occasional verses in both Latin and German. Walter’s theoretical engagement is demonstrated by treatises such as Lob und Preis der löblichen Kunst Musica (1538) and Lob und Preis der himmlischen Kunst Musica (1564).

Bibliography
Braun, Werner. “Walter [Walther], Johann [Johannes] (i).” Grove Music Online. Oxford University Press, 2001. Accessed July 15, 2025.
“Johann Walter.” Wikipedia. Accessed July 15, 2025.
Blankenburg, W. Johann Walter: Leben und Werk. Tutzing, 1991.
Gurlitt, W. Johannes Walter und die Musik der Reformationszeit. Luther-Jahrbuch 15 (1933): 1–112.
Asper, U. Aspekte zum Werden der deutschen Liedsätze in Johann Walters “Geistlichem Gesangbüchlein” (1524–1551). Baden-Baden, 1985.

Composers of the High Renaissance Era Playlist Track

52. Beati immaculati in via

Francesco Canova da Milano (b. Monza?, 18 August 1497; d. 2 January 1543) was a renowned Italian lutenist and composer, often called “il divino” for his celebrated artistry. Born into a family of musicians—his father Benedetto served as his early mentor—Francesco may have studied with Giovanni Angelo Testagrossa in Milan, though this is unconfirmed. His earliest appearance in historical records is as “Franciscus mediolanensis,” listed among papal esquires in Rome by May 1514. Francesco and his father were members of Pope Leo X’s private music ensemble, with Francesco continuing solo service until at least 1521.

Francesco spent much of his career in papal circles, performing for the courts of Leo X and Clement VII. He gained an international reputation, performing at banquets and elite gatherings in Rome and northern Italy. His patronage included figures such as Cardinal Ippolito de’ Medici and Ottavio Farnese, and in 1538 he played for the historic summit at Nice attended by Pope Paul III, Charles V, and François I. Francesco also held posts in Milan, including a canonry at San Nazaro Maggiore.

Marriage in 1538 to Clara Tizzoni brought him briefly back to Milan, though he returned to the papal sphere in the late 1530s. His last recorded activities include music teaching in the Farnese household and ongoing performances for the papal court. Francesco’s death is documented as occurring on 2 January 1543, likely outside Milan, though a commonly cited tombstone date of 1544 appears to be erroneous.

Francesco’s fame as a lutenist was extraordinary. His performances inspired legends—he was widely referred to as “Francesco del Liuto,” and his improvisational skill astonished his contemporaries. The majority of his surviving output consists of ricercares, fantasias, and intabulations of vocal pieces, which circulated widely in print and manuscript from 1529 to well after his death. He is credited with transforming the lute fantasia into a highly expressive, structurally flexible form, forging a style poised between the rhapsodic idiom of earlier generations and the strict imitation of later Renaissance masters.

His compositions—over ninety ricercares or fantasias, together with chanson, motet, and madrigal arrangements—are valued for their motivic development, nuanced narrative form, and the adoption of advanced contrapuntal and harmonic techniques drawn from contemporary vocal music. Highly influential in pedagogical and performance circles, Francesco’s works were used as compositional models by subsequent generations of lutenists. His music was published in major European centers and remained in print for over a century.

Bibliography
Pavan, Franco. “Francesco (Canova) da Milano.” Grove Music Online. Oxford University Press, 2001. Accessed July 17, 2025.
“Francesco Canova da Milano.” Wikipedia. Accessed July 17, 2025.
Ness, A.J., ed. The Lute Music of Francesco Canova da Milano (1497–1543). Cambridge, 1970.
Chiesa, R., ed. Francesco da Milano: Opere complete per liuto. Milan, 1971.
Slim, H.C. “Francesco da Milano (1497–1543/44): a Bio-Bibliographical Study.” JLSA 18 (1964): 63–84; 19 (1965): 109–28.
Pavan, F. “Ex paupertate evasit: Francesco da Milano et sa famille.” Le concert des voix et des instruments à la Renaissance: Tours 1991, 316–70.

Arnold von Bruck (c. 1500–1554), sometimes called Arnold de Pruck or Arnoldus Brugensis, was a Franco-Flemish composer who became one of the leading figures in the musical life of the Habsburg courts during the first half of the 16th century. He is best remembered for his contributions to both sacred and secular music, especially in German-speaking regions, and for his steadfast adherence to Catholicism during the Reformation.

Born most likely in Bruges, Arnold von Bruck began his musical training as a choirboy in the chapel of Emperor Charles V, where he may have studied with Marbrianus de Orto. By 1519, he had left the imperial chapel and, after a period of relative obscurity, was ordained a priest in the diocese of Thérouanne in 1527. That same year, he joined the court of Archduke Ferdinand—later Emperor Ferdinand I—as Kapellmeister, a position he held until his retirement in 1545. Among his responsibilities was the musical instruction of choirboys, including notable pupils such as Johann Zanger and Hermann Finck.

Throughout his career, Bruck received numerous ecclesiastical honors, including canonries at the cathedrals of Ljubljana and Zagreb, as well as a benefice at Laas, near Kočevje in Slovenia. Even after retiring from the Habsburg court, he continued to compose and was granted a chaplaincy at St. Stephen’s Cathedral in Vienna, where he wrote music for the choir. In his final years, he settled in Linz, holding a prosperous benefice until his death in 1554.

Arnold von Bruck’s surviving works are primarily vocal, encompassing motets, Magnificat settings, and German lieder, as well as polyphonic arrangements of folksongs and court melodies. His German sacred lieder are notable for anticipating later motet-style chorale settings. Among his most significant compositions are the polyphonic lieder, often featuring a tenor cantus firmus with instrumental accompaniment, and the burlesque song Es ging ein Landsknecht, as well as Ihr Christen allgleiche, which commemorates the Turkish siege of Vienna in 1529. His Latin sacred music, such as his settings of the Dies irae and Te Deum, demonstrates mastery of liturgical cantus firmus technique and the influence of Josquin des Prez.

Despite the loss of much of his Latin church music, Bruck’s reputation among his contemporaries was considerable. He was honored with medallions, dedications from fellow musicians, and the respect of both Catholic and Protestant figures. His works were published by prominent figures such as Georg Rhau, and he was widely praised for his compositional skill. Arnold von Bruck’s legacy endures as a bridge between the Franco-Flemish polyphonic tradition and the emerging German musical style of the High Renaissance.

References:
Othmar Wessely, revised by Walter Kreyszig, ‘Arnold von Bruck’, Grove Music Online
‘Arnold von Bruck’, Wikipedia

Robert Johnson (b. Duns, c. 1500; d. c. 1560) was a significant Scottish composer and priest whose surviving works represent a crucial link between the late medieval and early Renaissance traditions in British sacred music.

According to Thomas Wood’s marginal notes in the St Andrews Psalter, Johnson was born in Duns, Scotland, and became a priest. He was accused of heresy and fled to England long before the Scottish Reformation of 1560. While an act of parliament against Lutheran heresy was passed in Scotland as early as 1525, Johnson’s extant music for the Roman rite appears-on stylistic grounds-to date from the 1520s and 1530s. Although all of his surviving works are preserved in English sources, some early pieces (such as Ave Dei Patris filia and Laudes Deo) may have been composed in Scotland.

Wood also noted that Johnson knew Thomas Hudson the elder in England, and Johnson may have spent time in York before moving south in the 1530s. He is described as “peticanon of Windsor” in a late 16th-century manuscript, though details of his later life remain unclear. The tradition that Johnson served as chaplain to Anne Boleyn is unsubstantiated, though he did set a text attributed to her.

Johnson’s early Ave Dei Patris filia for five voices is a large-scale votive antiphon typical of British sacred music of the 1520s, featuring sectional writing for three, four, and five voices, and a mixture of free and imitative counterpoint. Laudes Deo is a richly decorated two-voice setting of a troped Christmas lesson, while Dicant nunc Judei (Easter verse, two voices) is shorter and simpler, using progressive structural imitation. His settings of the Easter responsory Dum transisset Sabbatum (for four and five voices) combine structural imitation with cantus firmus technique, producing striking dissonances. The Matins responsory Gaude Maria Virgo (four voices, with a later instrumental fifth) shows growing skill in imitation and motivic development, reflecting influences from the post-Josquin continental generation.

By the 1540s, Johnson was composing large-scale polyphonic settings of Latin psalm verses, such as Deus misereatur nostri (Psalm 67, four voices) and two settings of Domine in virtute tua (Psalm 21, five voices), all using consistent structural imitation. He also wrote English-texted sacred music in the new chordal style of the Reformation era, including O eternal God and Benedicam Domino, both published in John Day’s Certaine Notes (1565). Other works include I geve you a new commaundement and an English version of Deus misereatur nostri (Relieve us, O Lord). His settings for the Morning, Communion, and Evening Service are entirely homophonic and likely date from the 1550s.

Johnson’s secular music is limited, with Ty the mare tomboy surviving only in a single part, and Defiled is my name (traditionally linked to Anne Boleyn) resembling his sacred style. Com palefaced death may be a consort song or by a younger namesake.

He also composed instrumental consorts, including a five-part In Nomine, a five-part A knell (based on an ostinato), two canonic settings of O lux beata Trinitas, and a fragmentary O lux mundi. The In Nomine and canonic pieces are likely early works, while A knell represents a more mature style.

Johnson’s music bridges the late medieval and early Renaissance styles in Britain, showing both traditional and progressive features. His works, though preserved mainly in English sources, are central to the understanding of sacred and early Reformation music in Scotland and England.

References:
– Kenneth Elliott, “Johnson, Robert (i),” Grove Music Online
– “Robert Johnson (Scottish composer),” Wikipedia
– “HOASM: Robert Johnson (1),” Here Of A Sunday Morning

Composers of the Late Renaissance Era

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