Lorenzo da Firenze was one of the famous composers of Italian Trecento. Unfortunately, his bio details are scarce, birth date is unknown. Specialist theorize that he died around 1373. But Lorenzo left us some details that are integrated in his wonderful creations. His music is progressive and, occasionally, experimental. His relatively new technique contains visible French influence which was quite unusual for Italian music of that period.
Lorenzo da Firenze was not just a composer but also a famous music teacher in the period that we know as Italian ars nova. Throughout his life Lorenzo was a close friend of the brilliant Francesco Landini, and possibly his teacher too. In 1348 Lorenzo became a canon at the church of St Lorenzo and remained on this post for the remainder of his life.
His music became a part of the the Squarcialupi Codex. Up to this day this illuminated manuscript is the best source of Italian music in the 14th century. Lorenzo da Firenze is presented there with 16 pieces of music. He also left us his pedagogical manuscript “Antefana” and two mass movements.
Famous English composer of the Renaissance William Byrd lived a long life, perhaps even too long. Before he died in July 1623, Byrd created secular, consort, instrumental and sacred music in many of the forms popular in England of those times.
Byrd enjoyed outstanding reputation among English public and musicians. However, as it happened to many other European compsers his music in the end turned out to be surprisingly little influence. His native tradition of Latin music more or less died with him. During his exceptionally long life many of the forms of vocal and instrumental music he created eventually had lost their appeal to most musicians.
In our present times specialists put William Byrd on the same row with other great masters of European Renaissance music. His gigantic output is impressive: it consists of about 470 talented compositions. His ability to transform so many musical forms and add his own identity to them is one of his most impressive achievements as a composer.
Today we know much more about his life than even in 20th century. William Byrd was born in 1540 in London and had two brothers and four sisters. He started as a Chapel Royal choirboy and was lucky to land a great teacher – Thomas Tallis who was a leading composer there at the time. He moved up pretty fast as in 1563 Byrd obtained an envious position as a choirmaster and organist of Lincoln Cathedral. He held this post until 1572, and in 1568 married Julian Birley. This long-lasting produced no less than 7 children.
It seems that time spent at the Lincoln Cathedral was a happy one. Byrd wrote very interesting instrumental music there including a number of important keyboard works. Years after he left the cathedral, this composer would send there some of him compositions.
In 1572 a gifted English composer Robert Parsons, who worked at the Chapel Royal, accidentally drowned in the Trent river. That tragedy helped Byrd’s career who obtained Parson’s position in 1572. There he grew as a composer and made important contacts at the royal court. These contacts helped him along with Tallis obtain a patent for the printing music in 1975. For twenty one years these two composers ruled music paper and produced a gigantic join publication that consisted of 34 motets dedicated to the queen Elizabeth. Even though the publication became a big financial failure, Elizabeth granted Byrd and Tallis the leasehold on lands in the West country and East Anglia for 21 years.
Since the early 1570s William Byrd became a staunch and devout Catholic. Being a Catholic at the Elizabethan times was dangerous as Catholicism was considered bordering the sedition. From time to time Byrd got into serious trouble. In 1583 his membership of the Chapel Royal was temporarily suspended, Tudor authorities placed his house on the search list and restrictions were placed on Byrd’s movements.
These setbacks did not discourage Byrd. He re-established his reputation as a major composer in royal court and became a “house composer” of many powerful Catholic lords of England. He dedicated to many of them his numerous motets published in 1589 and 1591. At the same time he produced two influential sets of English songs as well. After all he was a single monopolist of paper music since his fellow monopolist and teacher Tallis had died.
Surprisingly, the 1580s turned out to be a productive decade for Byrd as a composer of instrumental music too. In 1591 he published his new collection of 42 of Byrd’s keyboard pieces. This collection shows Byrd’s talents and expertise in a wide variety of keyboard forms. Up to 1591 he also created an abundance of consort music, although some pieces did not reach us and got lost. The growing popularity is also reflected in his music that becomes a vivid and impressive word painting.
In 1594 Byrd was in his early fifties and semi-retired. He changed his residence and moved with his family to a small village Stondon Massey in Essex. His patron Sir John Petre, a wealthy landowner lived nearby. Petre was a devout Catholic and held clandestine Mass celebrations at his mansion.
Even in his late years when he was over 70, Byrd created sets of sonnets, songs and psalms heavily contributing to Anglican church music. He also wrote a collection of 21 brilliant keyboard pieces. He died a rich man surrounded by respect of local community that warmly called his “a father of music”. His death came when he was resting at the mansion of the Earl of Worcester.
Renaissance composer Jacob Clemens non Papa spent most of his life in Flanders. Unlike many of his contemporary Flemish composers and musicians, Clemens never traveled to Italy. As a result Italian influence is completely absent in his music. He was a prolific composer in many music styles, and famous for his polyphonic settings of the psalms in Dutch known as the Souterliedekens.
It is likely that the nickname “non Papa” was merely created in jest rather than for practical reasons. Nonetheless, the suffix “non Papa” has survived throughout the centuries. Jacob’s early life is unknown. The details of the years of his artistic maturity are very scarce. He may have been born around 1512 somewhere in the area of present day Belgium or the Netherlands. We learn of him as a popular composer from the late 1530s document. It mentions that Jacob Clemens published his collection of chansons in Paris. Between March 1544 and June 1545 he was a singer at the cathedral of Bruges, and shortly after he began business and then lifelong friendship relationship with Tillman Susana, the publisher in Antwerp.
From 1545 until 1549 he was probably choirmaster to Duke of Aerschot, preceding famous Renaissance composer Nicolas Gombert. In 1550 Marian Brotherhood in ‘s-Hertogenbosch employed Clemens as singer and composer. There is also evidence that he lived and worked in Ypres, Leiden, and Dordrecht. This is why in 2012, Clemens’ 500th anniversary will be celebrated in several of the towns where he is thought to have worked as a singer and composer.
Jacob Clemens died in 1555 or 1556. Some contemporary documents mention that he met the violent end but the details of his death are unknown. According to a later sources, Clemens was buried near Ypres in present-day Belgium. After Jacob’s death, his works were distributed to Germany, France, Spain, and England. The influence of Clemens was especially prominent in Germany.
Clemens was primarily a composer of sacred music. He was one of the main representatives of the generation between Josquin and Palestrina and Orlandus Lassus. His musical output was roughly 80 percent sacred music, either liturgical or for private use.
His career as a composer lasted for barely two decades, but Clemens was extremely productive writing 15 masses, 15 Magnificats, 233 motets and more than 100 secular works. But his most important, widely known and influential work turned out to be 159 Souterliedekens – Dutch settings of the psalms, using popular song melodies. They were published in 1556 by Tielman Susato and comprised the only Protestant part-music in Dutch during the Renaissance. Souterliedekens are generally simple, and designed to be sung by people at home. They use the well-known secular tunes, including drinking songs, love songs, ballads, and other popular songs of the time.
Walter Frye – this is how we call this early Renaissance composer who was possibly English. As with many other famous Renaissance composers we don’t know much and assume a lot. There are 3 “suspects” who could have been him, and one of them even had a different name. The other suspect died around 1474, so we assume that Walter Frye died at that year, yet we still don’t know how many years that Frye walked the earth.
However, a great composer, whom we name Walter Frye, created masses that influenced music works of such important Renaissance composers as Jacob Obrecht and Antoine Busnois.
Besides masses, Walter Frye also wrote popular motets and songs, including ballades. All of his surviving music is vocal, and some of his shorter secular music pieces became extraordinary famous in Italy, southern Germany, Bohemia and Austria, They were published there in numerous collections and different variations. Frye’s ballades and songs were often rearranged, plagiarized and copied.
As most of Walter Frye’s music manuscripts survived in continental Europe, experts think that famous English composer spent much of his time there. Yet, his music is closer to that of other English composers than to famous Franco-Flemish compositions of the Burgundian School. It is highly likely that most of Frye’s music still remain anonymous, as the few remaining English 15th century manuscripts rarely mention the names of composers. Besides, many English manuscripts were destroyed during the ransacking of the monasteries carried out by Henry VIII.
Franco Flemish Renaissance composer Cipriano de Rore, occasionally named just Cypriano, spent most of his adult life in Italy. He was extremely famous composer of madrigals in the middle of 16th century and reached prominence for his successful experimental development of the secular classical music.
Cipriano de Rore proved to be the model whom many of the great madrigalists of the late 16th century followed, including brilliant composer Claudio Monteverdi. Rore wrote 107 madrigals that are securely attributed to him; 16 secular Latin compositions, similar in form to madrigals; at least seven chansons; 53 motets, of which 51 survive; a Passion according to Saint John; five settings of the mass; some Magnificats; and a handful of other works.
Cipriano is the main representative of the next generation of Franco-Flemish composers after Josquin des Prez who left for Italy. He lived only 49 years from 1515 to 1565 and comes from a small town Ronse in Flanders. Musical experts still don’t have any idea where Cipriano got his musical training. Many gifted singers from the Netherlands reached Italy as children or adolescents, often when discovered and hired by visiting nobility. It might well be that Cipriano got his music education during his service in Italy with Margaret of Parma – the illegitimate daughter of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V.
Through secondary evidence specialists found out that Cipriano de Rore was a singer at San Marco in Venice and studied there with Adrian Willaert, In fact, Cipriano knew not just Willaert but all representatives of Venetian school and visited Venice not once before 1542. Since that year his luck changes for the better. His fame as a European composer is on the rise: within 3 years well known Venetian printer Scotto published his first book of madrigals, as well as two books of motets. All these books were re-printed two years later by various printers which shows that Cipriano still was extremely popular composer.
In 1546 Rore became a choirmaster at the service of Duke Ercole II d’Este in Ferrara. Cipriano was extremely productive during these times – he wrote masses, motets, chansons, and of course madrigals. In 1556 Duke Ercole awarded Rore a benefice for his exceptional service. Cipriano even began cultivating his relations with the court of Albrecht V of Bavaria in Munich, sending them music, and having 26 motets produced in an elaborately illustrated manuscript with miniatures. In 1558 he had to return to his homeland and take care of his elderly parents. He requested a leave of absence from his employer in Ferrara. On the way home Rore stopped in Munich where he assisted in preparation of the motet manuscript, and posed for the portrait. In Flanders, his brother died and he was helping his sister-in-law with estate matters. By December 1558 he had returned to Ferrara but lost his post in 1559 because new Duke hired Francesco Viola preferring him to a foreigner Rore.
Cipriano went north to his homeland but when he reached it in autumn 1559, he found that his hometown, Ronse, had been destroyed. After a stay in Antwerp Rore returned to Parma, Italy in 1560. He was unhappy there as Parma was not an intellectual cultural center as Ferrara or Venice. Rore left Parma in 1563, getting briefly the prestigious position of maestro di cappella at St. Mark’s. However he left this position due to insufficient salary in 1564 and returned to Parma where he died the next year, of unknown causes, at the age of only 49.
Rore was one of the most influential composers in the middle of the 16h century, mainly through the dissemination of his madrigals. His madrigal books were extraordinary at the time. His madrigal compositions established 5 voices as the norm, rather than 4, and created a symbiosis between polyphonic texture of Franco-Flemish motet with the Italian secular form. All of the lines of development in the madrigal in the 17th century can be traced to ideas first seen in Rore.
Rore also composed secular Latin motets, a relatively unusual “cross-over” form in the mid-16th century. These motets, being a secular variation of a normally sacred form, paralleled the sacred madrigal, the madrigale spirituale, which was a sacred variation on a popular secular form. Stylistically these motets are similar to his madrigals, and he published them throughout his career.
French Renaissance composer Antoine de Févin was a contemporary of great Josquin des Prez. Thus, Antoine shares many musical similarities with his famous colleague. Antoine left us, modern Renaissance music fans a nice heritage: his 14 masses, 3 lamentations, 3 Magnificats, 14 motets and 17 chansons survive. All of Févin’s surviving music is vocal.
As usual, we don’t have a lot of bio details about Antoine de Févin. Most likely, he was born in the family of an alderman in Arras around 1470. His brother Robert de Févin became a composer too. Although most Franco-Flemish composers of the time spent time in Italy, no evidence exists that Antoine ever went there.
He left Arras in the late 1480s and within a decade most likely became a priest, although there are no records to prove this. He was commonly known as maistre later in his life, so we can suspect that at some point Antoine may have obtained a master’s degree at a university. By 1507, he was a favorite composer and a singer of French king Louis XII. He died at Blois either in 1511 or a year later.
Antoine de Févin composed music in the most current styles which came into prominence around 1490. This is why his music is stylistically similar to Josquin’s in its clarity of texture and design, and progressive nature. Antoine was not much concerned with the careful setting of text. He liked more using vocal duets to contrast with the full sonority of the choir. Some of his vocal music technique was later perfected by Josquin giving a feeling of overall unity and complete equality of all the voices.
Famous French composer Antoine Brumel was one of the first renowned members of the Franco-Flemish Renaissance school. He was one of the most influential composers of his generation after Josquin des Prez. He was probably born around 1460 in the town of Brunelles, which makes hims on of the first Netherlands composer, who was French by nationality.
Antoine started as a singer in Notre-Dame de Chartres and, eventually became a choirmaster to the boys at Nore-Dame de Paris from 1498 to 1500. From 1506 he became a choirmaster at Ferrara replacing famous composer Jacob Obrechte who had succumbed to the plague there the previous year.
After 1510 Brummel’s life details become really sketchy. The chapel at Ferrara was disbanded and he evidently stayed in Italy. Officially, expert state that Brummel died either in 1512 or 1513. They named the city of Mantua as a place where he died. However, some of his contemporaries claim that he lived much longer and died of the “ripe age”. So, it is highly likely that Antonio Brummel lived much longer but the records have not survived.
Antoine Brumel was on the crossroads of European music changes in the beginning of the 16the century. The previous style of highly differentiated voice parts, composed consecutively was transitioning to smoothly flowing, equal parts, composed simultaneously. Brumel’s music reflects these changes – some of his earlier work was conforming to the older style, and later compositions showing the polyphonic fluidity.
In 21st century Antoine Brumel is best known for his masses. However, he also wrote numerous motets, chansons, and some instrumental music. Brumel’s music style significantly evolved throughout his life. His earlier works show rhythmic complexity of the Ockeghem generation, but the later ones used Josquin style smooth imitative polyphony as well as the textures of his contemporary Italian composers of popular songs.
Famous composer Johannes Ciconia was born in Liège around 1370 but lived and worked most of his life in Italy. His fame was widespread in late medieval times not just as a composer but also as a music theorist. Johannes Ciconia was a son of a priest and an anonymous to us woman of high standing.
We find him mostly in Italy particularly in the service of the Papal Chapels and at the cathedral of Padua. Discovered papal records tell us that Ciconia was in the service of Pope Boniface IX in Rome in 1391. Then there is a gap between the early 1390s and 1401 when we know nothing about his whereabouts.
From 1401 until his death in 1412, Johannes remained connected to the cathedral of Padua. Musical experts forward a theory that he arrived in Padua much earlier and learned there the ars subtilior style.
Ciconia masterfully created music that combined various styles of the time. He also experimented in a comparable commingling of styles. Some of his madrigals, saturated with music typical of northern Italy, are combined with the French ars nova.
Other Ciconia’s compositions are created in more complex ars subtilior style. His music is a great example of how the late Medieval style begins to morph into the melodic patterns of the Renaissance.
He wrote secular and sacred music. Ciconia’s survived musical heritage contains French virelais, Italian ballate and madrigals as well as motets and mass movements.
He also got recognition as the author of two medieval treatises on music: the Nova Musica, and De Proportionibus. His music-theoretical ideas stem are relatively conservative, unlike some works of his more progressive contemporaries.
There is a mystery connected to Johannes. Although Ciconia was an extremely famous and successful composer in Florence, there is no section for his works in the Squarcialupi Codex. His music is barely represented in the large Florentine sources. Luckily for us, the famous Q15 Manuscript has the abundance of Ciconia’s compositions. The manuscript is kept in International museum and library of music of Bologna.
Most famous composers who created music during the transitional period from Medieval to Renaissance styles did not leave to the future generations a lot of biographical information. Even though the aforementioned composers enjoyed extreme popularity and fame at their times, 21 century music experts still struggle with their dates of birth and death, origin and other data.
In this aspect an English composer who flourished at the period of 20 years from 1400 throughout 1420 got it even worse. We don’t even know his first name and not completely identified his last name which is either Byttering, or Bytering, Bytteryng, Biteryng. Only 5 of his compositions survived because they were included in the Old Hall manuscript, which also mentions his last name and omits his first name for whatever reasons.
That very manuscript also gives us scarce bits of data mentioning that Bytteryng was a canon at Hastings Castle between 1405 and 1408, and then he was a rector at undisclosed location in London in 1414.
However, Byttering’s music in the manuscript is beautiful and stands out from many other works due to its advanced style His most famous composition is the wedding motet En Katerine solennia written for the wedding on June 2, 1420, of King Henry V and Catherine of Valois. We like it and embedded it here from YouTube so you can enjoy it too.
Famous Franco-Flemish composer Arnold de Lantins became known to us for his work around 1420. After 1432 he disappears from history and his fate still remains unknown. He was possibly a close relative of the composer Hugo de Lantins who also spent many years in Italy.
Arnold de Lantins music appears alongside that of Dufay, Gilles Binchois and Johannes Ciconia in contemporary manuscript collections. He was held in high regard, and he was one of a few composers whose compositions show aspects of both medieval and Renaissance styles.
There are some hints that Arnold de Lantins was not just a contemporary of Guillaume Dufay but also a close friend. He was at many Italian locations with Dufay during his stayin Italy. Dufay even mentioned him in the text of a rondeau. In 1431 they were both singers in the papal choir in Rome. And within 6 months in Rome, he vanished and modern experts can not find a single line about Arnold’s life after 1432.
We can conclude that Arnold de Lantins was very famous and popular at his time. Wide distrubution of his compositions’ copies before the advent of printing press serves as evidence to his fame. He created not just religious but secular music as well, including French ballades and rondeaux that survived through the centuries.
Mysterious Franco-Flemish composer Hugo de Lantins left his trace for only a decade, from 1420 to 1430, after which he vanishes into the voide. He was composing his music in the style of the late Medieval era and early Renaissance. Hugo was on friendly terms with Guillaume Dufay – both composers wrote music for some of the same events. During his stay in Rimini Dufay even mentioned Hugo in the text to one of the compositions he wrote.
It is quite possible that he is a close relative of another famous composer Arnold de Lantins, who was active at the same time. Hugo and Arnold even were working in the same area – in Italy and, especially, in Venice. This just can’t be a coincidence.
Most of Hugo de Lantins s music is for three voices, though occasionally this composer added a fourth. His music is more progressive than Arnold’s as Hugo was widely using imitation which is prevalent in his compositions more than in the music of any other composer of the first part of the 15th century. In fact, that technique became dominating for the next hundred years.
As with many others famous composers, almost all biographical details of Hugo are missing. He wrote ceremonial music for Venetian Doge, which allows us to conclude that he spent some years in Venice. Besides, his music pops up in several Venetian collections. From the precise details that occur in the text of the music, musicologists think that Hugo wrote a composition for the wedding of Cleofe Malatesta and Theodore Palaiologos, Prince of Sparta, in 1421.
Some of his masses survived as well as 5 motets and numerous rondeaux and ballates. Most of them are in French and Italian.
Some time in the late 14th century there was a famous composer and music theorist. His name was Philipoctus de Caserta and he was composing a music in the complex and exquisite style known as ars subtilior. From time to time in the given period of time his name pops up in different interpretations like Philippus or Filipoctus.
His dates of birth and death are unknown and nationality is a mystery too. The only vague fact is derived from composer’s ballade. Lyrics hint that he worked at the Papal court at Avignon in 1370s. So everything about him is mystery.
But he left us his beautiful music, mostly ballades and 5 theoretical treatises. Recently experts discovered his rondeau and credo as well. All his pieces are for three voices. One of the ballades was created in honor for the powerful lord of Milan Bernabò Visconti. It seems that Philipoctus was so famous that other reputable composers borrowed portions of his ballades for their own songs.
Famous early Renaissance composer Baude Cordier was born around 1380 and died some time before 1440. Scarce biography details tell us that he was a French composer from Rhiems. However, his musical worsk are the best examples of ars subtilior.
Overall 10 secular music pieces of Baude’s survived and most of them are composed as rondeaux. Some of the pieces are written in the French style of ars subtilior, others are much simpler with greater emphasis on lyrical melody.
Two Cordier’s chansons came to us with the famous Chantilly Manuscript. They were added at a slightly later date, right at the front of the manuscript. They became famous because both chansons use unusual shapes to reflect their musical contents. For example, Baude’s song Belle, Bonne, Sage is presented in the manuscript in the shape of the heart.
Early Quattrocento composer Bartolomeo da Bologna was originally from northern Italy. He composed his music during the transitional period between Trecento and early Renaissance.
We caught only a very short period when Bartolomeo became a popular and famous composer in Italy: from 1405 through 1427. His biographical information is practically unknown. He came from Bologna and spent some years in Ferrara. Bartolomeo was a member of Benedictine order. He served as an organist and then a prior in San Nicolò cathedral in Ferrara.
During 15th century many composers and musicians working in Italy were foreigners, mostly émigrés from northern Europe. Bartolomeo da Bologna was one of only a few native Italian composers in that time. His survived musical heritage is seven pieces, stylistically related to ars subtilior which flourished in Avignon.
Paolo da Firenze is one of the giants of Italian ars nova composers. The musical heritage of this Italian composer and music theorist is huge and can be comparable only to one Trecento composer – Francesco Landini. Paolo was composing music in the late 14th and early 15th centuries. His music shows the gradual transition of the style from Middle Ages to the Renaissance.
In many cases we know practically nothing about the composers of the 14th century. Details about their lives are sparse or nonexistent. However biography of Paolo da Firenze is more or less complete. Paolo da Firenze also known as Paolo Tenorista was born in 1355 in Florence. He came from a poor family and had 3 brothers.
Around 1380 he joined a Benedictine monastic order and in 1401 he became an abbot of St. Martin al Pino monastery. He left his post in 1433 when he was 78 years old. Paolo died in 1436 in Florence when he was 81 years old, at an unusually advanced age for that time.
In the first decade of the 15th century Paolo da Firenze supervised the creation of the most important source of 14th century music in Italy – Squarcialupi Codex. There is a picture of Paolo in the codex showing him in a Benedictine black cassock. Squarcialupi Codex also contains the biggest puzzle related to him.
While there is a name on top and his portrait on the front of Squarcialupi Codex, his music in the codex is missing – there are only blank pages. Modern experts advanced many theories but, naturally, it is impossible to guess why this happened.
Most of Italian composer’s music that reached us is secular, except for 2 sacred compositions. His music had both progressive and conservative aspects. Musicologists have hard time to establish how much of Paolo da Firenze music is lost. All his surviving compositions abruptly end in 1410. There is no information about his music for the last 26 years of his life.
Paolo da Firenze music is influenced by Avignon ars subtilior. Some of his madrigals did not escape the influence of Landini music as well.
