Netherland masters. At this time the Dutch led the world in painting, in
the liberal arts and in commercial enterprise. Their skill in mechanics
was unequalled, and we naturally expect to see their musicians further
the development of musical technique. We must bear in mind facts to
which the writer has had to refer elsewhere ("Story of Music," p.
21). "The general tendency of European thought at this time also had
its bearing on the tone art. Scholasticism was in full sway, and such
philosophers as Albertus Magnus, John Duns Scotus and William of Ockham
were engaged in wondrous metaphysical hair-splitting, endeavoring to
reduce Aristotelianism to a Christian basis by the application of
the most vigorous logic. This spirit of scholasticism entered music,
and contrapuntal science by too much learning was made mad." Yet the
essential nature of music could not be wholly suppressed, and as the
writers of the time acquired that marvellous mastery of musical material
which came from their practice of counterpoint, they began to use their
science as a means and not an end; and finally the masters of the
Netherland school attained the loftiest heights of church composition.
Various divisions of the periods of development of this school have been
made. That adopted by the writer is Emil Naumann's with some alterations.
It does not appear to be necessary to set the Dutch members of the
school apart from the Belgians; and the writer, in his estimate of the
comparative importance of the masters, agrees with Kiesewetter and Fétis
rather than with Naumann. The division of the school into four periods,
as follows, seems to be a fair one:
NETHERLANDS SCHOOL (1425-1625 A. D.).
First Period, 1425-1512.
Chief masters: Ockeghem, Hobrecht, Brumel.
Second Period, 1455-1526.
Chief masters: Josquin des Près, Jean Mouton.
Third Period, 1495-1572.
Chief masters: Gombert, Willaert, Goudimel, De Rore, Jannequin,
Arkadelt.
Fourth Period, 1520-1625.
Chief masters: Orlando Lasso, Swelinck, De Monte.
Johannes Ockeghem, the most accomplished writer of the first period, was
born between 1415 and 1430, probably at Termonde in East Flanders. It is
likely that he studied music under Binchois, a contemporary of Dufay. At
any rate an Ockeghem was one of the college of singers at the Antwerp
cathedral in 1443, when Binchois was choir master. About 1444 the youth
entered the service of Charles VII. of France, as a singer. He stood
high in the favor of Louis XI., who made him treasurer of the church of
St. Martin's at Tours. There Ockeghem passed the remainder of his life,
retiring from active service about 1490. He died about 1513.
Octavio dei Petrucci, of Fossombrone, invented movable types for printing
music in 1502, and obtained a patent for the exclusive use of the process
for fifteen years in 1513. By that time the advance in the mastery of
counterpoint had left Ockeghem somewhat out of fashion; and it is,
therefore, not remarkable that Petrucci's earliest collections contain
nothing by this master. Not till years after his death was any mass or
motet of his given to the world. Then only one was printed entire. This
was his "Missa cujusvis toni," which was plainly selected because of its
science. Extracts from his "Missa Prolationum" were used in theoretical
treatises; and, indeed, Ockeghem's music seems generally to have been
cherished wholly on account of the technical instruction which might
be derived from it. The list of his extant compositions, as given in
Scribner's "Cyclopedia of Music," is as follows:
"Missa cujusvis toni," in Liber XV., missarum (Petreius, Louvain, 1538);
six motets and a sequence (Petrucci, Venice, 1503); an enigmatic canon in
S. Heyden's "Ars Canendi" and in Glarean's "Dodekachordon"; fragments of
"Missa prolationum" in Heyden's book and in Bellermann's "Kontrapunkt";
mass "De plus en plus," MS. in Pontifical Chapel, Rome; two masses,
"Pour quelque peine" and "Ecce ancilla Domini," in the Brussels Library;
motets in MS. in Rome, Florence and Dijon; six masses, an Ave and some
motets in Van der Straeten; Kyrie and Christe, from "Missa cujusvis toni"
in Rochlitz.
This list is probably correct except the six motets and a sequence set
down as published by Petrucci in 1503. Ambros, who is always trustworthy
and who mentions all these works and also three songs ("D'ung aultre
mer," "Aultre Venus" and "Rondo Royal") and a motet ("Alma redemptoris")
in MS. at Florence, did not discover any publications by Petrucci. The
enigmatical canon was solved by Kiesewetter, Burney, Hawkins and other
historians; but the solution believed to be most nearly correct is that
of the profound contrapuntist and excellent historian, Fétis. Glareanus
(Dodekachordon, p. 454) speaks also of a motet for thirty-six voices.
This was, no doubt, originally written for six or nine voices, the other
parts being derived from them by canons. It is not certain, however,
that Ockeghem ever wrote such a work. The "Missa cujusvis toni" ("A mass
in any tone," or scale, as we should say now) may have been written as
an exercise for the master's pupils, as some historians conjecture,
but it seems more probable that it was a natural outgrowth of the
puzzle-building spirit of the time and of Ockeghem's especial fondness
for displays of musical ingenuity. The peculiarity of the mass is that
it employs in a remarkable manner all the church modes or scales. It was
sung in Munich many years after Ockeghem's death and a corrected copy of
it is still preserved in the chapel.
Fétis says: "As a professor, Ockeghem was also very remarkable, for all
the most celebrated musicians at the close of the fifteenth and beginning
of the sixteenth century were his pupils." In the "Complaint" written
after his death by William Grespel, appear the following lines:
"Argicola, Verbonnet, Prioris,
Josquin des Près, Gaspard, Brumel, Compère,
Ne parlez plus de Joyeul chants, ne ris,
Mais composez un ne recorderis,
Pour lamentir nostre maîstre et bon père."
Antoine Brumel achieved the greatest distinction among these pupils. He
was born about 1460 and died about 1520. His personal history is lost.
The present age possesses, however, a fuller record of his work than it
has of his master's. In one volume printed by Petrucci in 1503 and to
be found in the Royal Library at Berlin, there are five of his masses.
Another mass by this composer is in a volume of works by various writers,
printed also by Petrucci. A copy of this composition is in the British
Museum. A number of masses and motets of his are scattered through other
collections of Petrucci's. Others exist in MS. in Munich. Brumel's motet,
"O Domine Jesu Christe, pastor bone," quoted by Naumann, is written in
a clear and dignified style, abounds in full chords, and contains only
such passages of imitation as would readily suggest themselves. A better
example of the style of the period is his canonic, "Laudate Dominum,"
given by Foskel and Kiesewetter.
Jacob Hobrecht, the principal Dutch master of the first Netherland
period, was born about 1430, at Utrecht, where he subsequently became
chapel-master. It does not appear on record anywhere that he was a pupil
of Ockeghem, but he was unquestionably a disciple of that composer.
He achieved celebrity in his life time and was honored with many
distinctions. He wrote a mass for the choir of the Bruges Cathedral,
and the whole body journeyed to Antwerp to pay him homage. It is stated
that he also received a visit from Bishop Borbone of Cortona, leader of
the papal choir. Hobrecht became chapel-master at Utrecht, about 1465,
and had there a choir of seventy voices. A part of his life was spent in
Florence at the court of Lorenzo the Magnificent, where he met Josquin
des Près.
The indefatigable Ambros goes into a careful discussion of eight masses
of Hobrecht's, published in the Petrucci collections. Of these the best,
known as the "Fortuna desperata," was published in modern notation at
Amsterdam in 1870. Examples of Hobrecht's writing are also to be found in
the works of Burney, Forkel, Kiesewetter, and Naumann. One of Hobrecht's
musical feats was the composition of a mass in a single night. His works
contain all the canonic inventions employed by Ockeghem, and are a mine
of contrapuntal learning. Doubtless when sung by the trained cathedral
choirs of their period, they were impressive to ears not attuned to
modern tonality.
So much for the personal history of the most brilliant lights of the
time. More instructive will be a review of the musical character of their
work.
It is the prevailing influence of one or two masters in each period
that marks its extent. Its character was formed by that influence,
and salient features of the style of each period may be fairly
distinguished. The first period was marked by the extreme development
of the canon. Perhaps for the benefit of the reader who may not have
studied counterpoint it would be well to give here one or two elementary
definitions. Imitation, in the words of Sir Frederick A. Gore-Ouseley, is
"a repetition, more or less exact, by one voice of a phrase or passage
previously enunciated by another. If the imitation is absolutely exact
as to intervals it becomes a canon." Canon is the most rigorous species
of imitation. Naturally then, as imitation is the foundation of fugal
writing, the first occupation of musicians was its perfection. Thus we
see that the composers of the first period of the Netherland school were
almost wholly engaged in exploring the resources of canonic composition,
and the most celebrated of their number, Ockeghem, was he who displayed
the greatest ingenuity in this style. To describe the various forms of
canonic jugglery invented by Ockeghem and his contemporaries would weary
the reader; but a few may be mentioned as examples of the craft exercised
at that time.
First, there was the "cancriza," or backward movement of the cantus
firmus, in which the melody was repeated interval by interval, beginning
at the last note and moving toward the first. Second, there was the
inverted canon, in which the inversion consisted of beginning at the
original first note and proceeding with each interval reversed, so that a
melody which had ascended would, in the inversion, descend. In the canon
by augmentation the subject reappears in one of the subsidiary parts
in notes twice as long as those in which it was originally announced.
Conversely in the canon by diminution the subject is repeated in notes
of smaller duration than those first used. These four forms are still
extant and have been employed by most great composers of modern music
from Bach to the present time. The canon by augmentation is often used in
choral music, especially in the bass, with superb effect. Indeed all the
varieties described are to be found in the music of Handel and Bach, the
latter being a complete master of their use in instrumental as well as
choral composition.
But the composers of the first Netherland period employed kinds of
canonic writing which are now looked upon as mere curiosities. Among
these were the repetition of the cantus firmus beginning with the second
note and ending with the first; the repetition with the omission of all
the rests; the perfect repetition of the whole melody; a repetition half
forward and half backward; and another with the omission of all the
shortest notes. Naumann is of the opinion that these forms "arose from
an earnest desire to consolidate a system of part-writing which could
only exist after a complete mastery had been obtained over all kinds of
musical contrivances." Kiesewetter, also generous in his views, says that
these writers excel their predecessors in possessing "a greater facility
in counterpoint and fertility in invention; their compositions, moreover,
being no longer mere premeditated submissions to the contrapuntal
operation, but for the most part being indicative of thought and sketched
out with manifest design, being also full of ingenious contrivances
of an obligato counterpoint, at that time just discovered, such as
augmentation, diminution, inversion, imitation; together with canons and
fugues of the most manifold description."
Of Ockeghem in particular, Rochlitz ("Sammlung vorzüglicher
Gesangstücke," Vol. I., p. 22) says: "His style was distinguished from
that of his predecessors, especially Dufay, principally in two ways: it
was more artistic and was not founded on well-known melodies, but in part
on freely made melodic movements contrapuntally developed, which rendered
the style richer and more varied."
This statement is undoubtedly true, and may be taken for all it is
worth. But the prima facie evidence of the works of these masters is
that the writers were bent on exhausting the resources of canonic
ingenuity, that their private study was all devoted to the exploration
of academic counterpoint, that they worked in slavish obedience to the
contrapuntal formulas which they themselves had contrived, and that their
most ambitious compositions were nothing more or less than brilliant
specimens of technical skill. To this estimate of their work excellent
support is given by the significant criticism of Martin Luther on the
writing of Josquin des Près, chief master of the second period. The great
reformer said: "Josquin is a master of the notes; they have to do as he
wills, other composers must do as the notes will." Furthermore the Latin
formulas used in noting canons in Ockeghem's day go far toward proving
that it was the mechanical ingenuity of the form which appealed to the
masters of that time. They were in the habit of putting forth a canonic
subject with the general indication "Ex una plures," signifying that
several parts were to be evolved from one, and a special direction, such
as "Ad medium referas, pausas relinque priores," darkly hinting at the
manner of the working out. These riddle canons date back to Dufay's time,
but they were the special delight of Ockeghem and his contemporaries.
The results of such practice could only be musical mathematics, yet the
masters of this period performed a lasting service to art; for they laid
down rules for this kind of composition and in their own works indicated
the path by which artistic results might be reached by their successors.
The highest praise that can be awarded to their works is that they are
profound in their scholarship, not without evidences of taste in the
selection of the formulas to be employed, and certainly imbued with a
good deal of the dignity which would inevitably result from a skilful
contrapuntal treatment of the church chant. Ambros finds evidences of
design in one of Ockeghem's motets, from which he quotes, but the design
is certainly not of the kind which would call for praise if discovered
in contemporaneous music. Naumann, who is quite carried away by the
improvement of the first Netherlands compositions over those of the
French contrapuntists, is warm in his praise of these early canonists. He
says:
"Almost at the beginning of the Netherland school, mechanical invention
was made subservient to idea. It was no longer contrapuntal writing
for counterpoint's sake. Excesses were toned down, and the desire
unquestionable was that the contrapuntist's art should occupy its proper
position as a means to an end. Euphony and beauty of expression were the
objects of the composer. In part writing each voice was made to relate
to the other in a manner totally unknown to the Paris masters. Such were
the first beginnings of the 'canonic' form, and fugato system of writing,
the herald of that scholarly class of compositions known as fugues, the
end and aim of which it is to connect in the closest possible manner the
various component parts. It was this complete mastery over counterpoint
in all its varying details that gave to the tone-masters such unbounded
artistic liberty. No longer was it necessary that they should, like the
organists, cantors, and magisters of Paris and Tournay, exhibit their
power over newly-acquired contrivances, but, as inheritors of a system
of inventive skill, the devices and contrivances fell into their proper
and natural channel, and were regarded as merely subordinate to a purer
tonal expression of feelings than had hitherto been attempted. Henceforth
counterpoint was but a means to an end, and art-music began to assume
for the first time the characteristics of folk-music, i. e., the free,
pure and natural outflow of heart and mind, with the invaluable addition,
however, of intellectual manipulation."
Naumann's comments are the result of his overvaluation of the purely
tentative labors of the early French school and his manifest eagerness to
find grounds for laudation of the writers of the first Netherland period.
It is a plain fact, to which all evidence points, that the man looked up
to as the chief master of the period was a profound academician and that
he was greater as a teacher than as a composer. That his successors did
achieve something in the way of euphonic beauty and freedom of style is
certainly true, as can be demonstrated by an examination of the works
of Josquin des Près. Even the Dutchmen Hobrecht and Brumel sometimes
struggled toward a simpler and purer musical expression than was to be
attained through Ockeghem's canonic labyrinths, but the famous teacher's
influence prevailed over the spirit of his time, and the musicians were,
for the most part, like the Mastersingers, slaves of the contemporaneous
_leges tabulaturae_. The unbounded delight which they took in the
solution of riddle canons is a proof of the view they took of their art.
Dr. Langhans, who is too calm a critic to be led into special pleading,
says:
"The origin of the methods of notation which were in favor with the
Netherlandic composers is to be sought in the fact that the newly
acquired art of counterpoint was regarded preëminently as a means of
exercising the sagacity of the composer as well as of the performer."
The author continues pointing out that "at last there existed so many
signs, not strictly belonging to notation, that a composition for many
voices, even when these entered together, could be written down with but
one series of notes, it being left to the sagacity of the performers to
divine the composer's intention by means of the annexed signs."
Thus we see that the first period of the Netherland school was
characterized by a search after ingenious forms, and this search was
carried to such an extent that the composer, having found a new form,
gave a hint at it and then invited the executant to do a little searching
on his own account. The writer believes that his assertion that this was
an era of pure mechanics in music is sound and is supported by sufficient
evidence.
[Illustration: JOSQUIN DES PRÈS.
From Van der Straeten's "Musique aux pay bas," loaned by the Newberry
Library, Chicago.]
But it was an era of short duration. Although Ockeghem and his closest
imitators carried the mechanical period up to 1512, it overlapped the
beginning of the second period, in which euphony sought and found
recognition in music. The chief master of the period, Josquin des Près
(his name appears in different places as Jodocus a Prato and a Pratis),
was the first real genius in the history of modern music.
Like Fétis, "I should never finish if I undertook to cite all the
authorities who show the high esteem which Josquin des Près enjoyed in
his day and after his death." Nothing more admirable has been written
in regard to this master than that portion of Fétis's prize essay of
1828 which treats of him, and it would be a pleasure to give a full
translation of it; but that is impracticable. On the authority of
Duverdier, Ronsard, the poet, and others, Fétis shows that Josquin was
born about 1450 in the province of Hainault, probably at Condé. His
correct name, as shown by his epitaph, was Josse. Josquin comes from
the Latinized form of Jossekin, a diminutive of his name. His early
instruction in music he obtained as a choir boy in St. Quentin, where in
his young manhood he became chapel master. St. Quentin is not far from
Tours, and at the latter place lived Ockeghem. Thither went Josquin to
study under the most famous master of the day. It is impossible to be
sure at this time whether Josquin became chapel-master immediately after
finishing his studies or first went to Italy. It is probable that his
term of study under Ockeghem was a long one, for he became a perfect
master of all his teacher's wonderful contrapuntal knowledge. Adam de
Bolensa, author of a work dealing with the history of the choir of the
papal chapel, says that Josquin was a singer there during the pontificate
of Sixtus IV., which lasted from 1471 till 1484. While there he wrote
several of his finest masses, of which the MSS. are still carefully
preserved in the library of the Sistine chapel. Josquin had already
achieved great distinction and was rapidly rising to the position of
first composer of his day.
On the death of Sixtus IV. he betook himself to the court of Hercules
d'Est, duke of Ferrara. Under the patronage of this nobleman he wrote
his mass "Hercules dux Ferrariae" and his Miserere. In spite of the
magnificence of the court of Ferrara and the opportunity of a permanent
settlement, Josquin remained only a short time, and departed into France,
where he at once obtained the favor of Louis XII. and became his _premier
chanteur_. This, however, was not a post of such importance as the
master deserved and he again sought a new patron. This time he entered
the service of Maximilian I., the emperor of the Netherlands. This
potentate made him provost in the cathedral of Condé, where he passed
the remainder of his life, dying, as the epitaph in the choir of the
cathedral shows, on August 27, 1521.
The most noted of Josquin's disciples was Jean Mouton, who died in 1522.
He was so faithful a scholar that a motet of his was for a long time
supposed to be the work of Josquin. He also wrote several psalms, but his
masses and motets are his best works.
Josquin des Près attained greater celebrity in his lifetime than any
other composer in the early centuries of modern music except Orlando
di Lasso. Baini, the biographer of Palestrina, says there was "only
Josquin in Italy, only Josquin in France, only Josquin in Germany; in
Flanders, in Bohemia, in Hungaria, in Spain, only Josquin." Fétis says,
"His superiority over his rivals, his fecundity and the great number
of ingenious inventions which he spread through his works placed him
far beyond comparison with other composers, who could do no better than
become his imitators." A large number of Josquin's works exists yet
and bears evidence to the justice of the esteem in which he was held
by his contemporaries. His printed compositions are nineteen masses,
fifty secular pieces, and over one hundred and fifty motets. His finest
masses are the "La sol fa re mi," "Ad fugam," "De Beata Virgine" and "Da
Pacem." The Incarnatus of the last, in Naumann's judgment, has never been
surpassed by any master of modern times.
Josquin, as already intimated, was the first composer who strove to make
contrapuntal ingenuity a means and not an end, and he is, therefore,
to be credited with the introduction of a new era in music. It must
not be supposed that he was always wise, for he twice set to music the
genealogy of Christ, a subject in which no romantic composer would seek
for inspiration. Again he continued the practice of writing masses on
the melodies of popular songs such as "L'Homme Armé," mingling the text
of the song with the solemn words of the liturgy in a way which showed a
lack of perfect artistic taste. Fétis's estimate of Josquin's genius is
worthy of reproduction here. He says: