Polyphonic treasures from the Alamire scriptorium Some 500 years ago, an unknown German musician from Nuremberg arrived in the Low Countries, having...
Polyphonic treasures
from the Alamire scriptorium
Some 500 years ago, an unknown German musician from Nuremberg arrived in
the Low Countries, having probably travelled by way of the trade routes leading
from southern Germany to Antwerp. He called himself Petrus Alamire, a pseudonym
that any trained musician would have immediately recognised as a reference to
the late Medieval system of musical education that made use of the hand of
Guido d'Arezzo. The combination of the pitch 'a' and the note names la, mi, and
re (found in the three hexachords) are the main elements involved.
The man behind this
pen name was in fact one Petrus Imhoff or Imhove or Van den Hove. He was
probably educated in the Nuremberg of Dürer and received his first known
commissions as a music calligrapher in the Low Countries, for organizations in
's-Hertogenbosch (Illushious Confraternity of Our Lady, in 1497) and Antwerp
(Collegiate Church of Our Lady, in 1499) Alamire very quickly rose to become
one of the most desired music calligraphers and producers of beautiful choir
books in the Low Countries. Important commissions were not slow in coming: in
1503 he realised a royal edition for Philip the Fair, in 1509 he entered the
service of Archduke Charles as escripvain et garde des livres, and in
1511 he took on a double assignment for the emperor Maximilian and his daughter
Margaret of Austria. The manuscripts soon played a role in the pan-European
political dealings of the Burgundian-Habsburgs. Many rulers needed to be
'bought off by Archduke Charles in order to win their votes for the approaching
election of Holy Roman Emperor in 1519. Charles chose the motto Plus oultre,
that was probably set to music by an anonymous composer (Vienna,
Osterreichische National-bibliothek, Handschriftensammlung, MS 9814). The
court's frequent choice of such manuscripts as one-of-a kind official gifts
should come as no surprise, considering that many influential rulers, including
the elector Frederick the Wise of Saxony and Pope Leo X, showed a great interest
in music, at a time when the polyphony at the Burgundian-Habsburg court was
blossoming as nowhere else in Europe, and when Alamire had developed a unique
and highly refined Ghent-Bruges style to illuminate his calligraphic musical
editions. These manuscripts have often been very well preserved and are held as the
treasures of a number of important European libraries, including Brussels (the
former court library), Jena (choir books from the collection of Frederick the
Wise), Munich (codices of Wilhelm IV of Bavaria), London (the Henry VIII
manuscript), the Vatican (for Pope Leo X),and Vienna (former Habsburg
court library).
After the imperial elections Alamire continued to remain active, and his
atelier, where numerous scribes were now employed, produced weighty editions of
the finest quality, illuminated in the Ghent-Bruges style. In particular, the
members of the Habsburg house showed great interest: in 1523, Margaret of
Austria ordered additions made to the chansonnier (Brussels, Royal
Library, MS 228) that was first made for her in 1516; imperial choir books were
produced for Charles' trčs noble plaisir and carried to Spain by a
special envoy for use by the Capilla Flamenca that resided there
(1523/1526); and Alamire made a number of manuscripts in the 1530s for Maria of
Hungary, the governess of the Low Countries after Margaret of Austria, who
rewarded him in his old age with a pension.
Among other proud owners of Alamire manuscripts were Raimund Fugger, a
member of the bankers' family that had supported Charles V, and Archduke
Wilhelm IV of Bavaria, who helped to stem the tide of advancing Protestantism.
Finally, a number of important churches (and collegiate churches), such as the
Church of Our Lady in Antwerp, and especially the richer brotherhoods, such as
the two in 's-Hertogenbosch and Antwerp mentioned above, were in a position to
acquire Alamire manuscripts, which they cherished as valuable works of art, as
the following note shows: [10/1/1514] "pro meester Petter Alam˙re sangschriffer
gedaen 1£ vlems omdadt hij ons aen gegeven heeft te maeken eenen coostelick
sangboeck voer ons capelle in manyiren die noodt dis gelixs en zal gesin zijn
al met mottetten van 5 st˙mmen." ("for Master Peter Alamire,
music copyist, paid 1£ Flemish because he has promised to make us a costly
singing book for our chapel, the likes of which will never again be seen, with
motets for five voices").
Although many
interesting aspects of Alamire's life remain obscure, we do have a good
overview of his biography. We know that he lived first in Antwerp and later in
Mechelen, that he was married to Katlyne vander Meeren, that he dealt in
manuscripts, various musical instruments (cornetti, crumhorns, flutes,
clavichords), lute strings, and even paintings, that he instructed Christian II
of Denmark, a brother-in-law to Charles V (who was later banished), in the
business of mining, and that he also carried letters for such eminent humanists
as Pirckheimer and Dürer, the latter of whom referred to Alamire as a 'a man
not lacking for humour' (homo non infestivus). But the most intriguing
part of his life story was his activity as a spy for the English court of Henry
VIII in the years 1515-1518. Partly with the help of his cover as a merchant of
manuscripts, 'minstrel/singer/chaplain' Alamire spied on Richard de la Pole,
nicknamed 'the White Rose', who was the exiled English pretender to the throne,
resident chiefly in Metz. Eventually the English court began to suspect their
top agent, whom they had originally trusted wholeheartedly, of counter-espionage.
Even a gift of five part books, a splendid parchment choir book, eight
cornetti, and many lute strings, together with secret political information,
were not able to convince Henry VIII and his lord chancellor, Cardinal Wolsey,
of his loyalty.
Despite all this,
Alamire will surely go down in history chiefly as an eminent music
calligrapher, who with his atelier of copyists, illuminators, and miniaturists,
successfully spread Flemish polyphony throughout western Europe, and
particularly throughout the leading royal courts. Some 850 compositions of very
high quality (mostly Masses, followed by motets, chansons, and a few
instrumental works and polyphonic songs on Dutch texts) have come down to us
through this collection of no fewer than 48 choir books and twelve (sets of)
fragments, often discovered in book bindings. The most important polyphonists
of the period 1495-1535 are represented, including the eminence grise Johannes
Ockeghem, Notenmeister Josquin Desprez, Margaret's favourite Pierre
de la Rue (with by far the most compositions), and the newcomer Adrian
Willaert. Although it is not strictly speaking taken from the corpus of Alamire
manuscripts, a splendid musical genealogy can be heard in the 'composers'
motet' Mater floreat florescat by Pierre Moulu, that was probably
written around 1517.
The corpus of Alamire
manuscripts offers an ideal source for a CD programme. From this unique body of
documents we have selected a number of representative works that act as a
sample of Alamire's production between about 1497 and 1535. A special place in
the whole is held by the above-mentioned chansonnier of Margaret of
Austria (Brussels, Royal Library, MS 228), both for its content (for example,
the many regretz chansons) and its form. The manuscript opens with the
remarkable six-voice motet Ave sanctissima Maria, probably by Pierre de
la Rue, which takes the form of a triple canon. The tenor of this motet is
illuminated by a miniature of Margaret praying to the Virgin Mary. This scion
of the Burgundian-Habsburg house (represented by the coat of arms in the bass
part) is clearly dedicating the song book to Mary (represented by the miniature
of the crowned Virgin with the Christ child). Margaret's favoured composer, de
la Rue, composed a mass on this motet. In the Agnus Dei of this
Mass, de la Rue weaves an as yet unidentified cantus firmus (O dulcis amica
Dei) as a canon into the complex polyphony. The chansonnier includes
just one song on a Dutch text, Myn hert altyt heeft verlanghen, that
also serves as a model for a Mass by Matthias Gascogne. In the Kyrie of
this Mass the chanson is clearly recognisable. The popularity of this
work is indicated by its inclusion in four Alamire manuscripts.
Mass movements were in
practice often combined with motets, a procedure we have also applied on this
CD. Celeste beneficium, with its second part, Adiutorium nostrum (probably
by Fevin or Mouton), was originally a motet for the French king, mentioning
respectively St Anne (Anne of Bretagne, the French queen), Renatus (the saint
who hears the prayers of pregnant women and childless couples, his name meaning
literally 'reborn'), and Ludovicus (Louis XII). In a manuscript presented to
the English king, we also find St Catherine (Catherina of Aragon, the first
wife of Henry VIII), Georgius, and Henricus 'rex', a clear reference to the
English king. A third version of the work places Anne at the center. This
reading of the motet was created for Queen Anne of Hungary, the wife of
Ferdinand of Hungary/Bohemia, brother of Charles V. We have, however, chosen a
fourth variant, originating in the Low Countries, which substitutes St Rumoldus
(patron of the cathedral in Mechelen) and Margareta, an explicit reference to
the Regent resident there.
The theme of sorrow -
so emphatically present in the chansonnier belonging to Margaret, who
was forever marked by the premature death of each of her two husbands - is most
fully present in the seven-voice motet Proch dolor, which, as a sign of
mourning, is recorded completely in black notation. It is a musical 'tombeau'
on the death of Margaret's father, Maximilian. The work is masterful in its
construction: next to a three-voice canon under the motto Celum terra
mariaque succurrite pia (Heaven, earth, and sea come to the aid of the
pious), four voices sing of the death of the monarch.
In the last manuscript
that Alamire produced for the Illustrious Confraternity of Our Lady in
's-Hertogenbosch (codex 72a), the younger generation of the post-Josquin era
is represented, with Adrian Willaert in the vanguard. He is the composer of the
Agnus Dei from the two to five-voice Missa super Benedicta, based
on his own motet of the same name, and on the Gregorian chant Benedicta.
The sacred portion of the CD concludes with an anonymous Salve regina. With
its 29 settings of the Salve regina, manuscript 34 from the Bayerische
Staatbibliothek in München is unique of its kind, although archival research
suggests that Alamire must have made other such Marian manuscripts, especially
for brotherhoods devoted to the Virgin. Settings of the Salve regina were
highly suited to the daily worship of the Virgin, but could also be used at the
end of a Mass. Unusual here is the superius of Myn hert heard in the
superius of the motet, in combination with fragments of the Gregorian Salve
regina.
For the performance of
sacred music, Marguerite and her nephew Charles had at their disposal the grande
chapelle that Charles had inherited from his father Philip the Fair and
that he later would rename the Capilla Flamenca when he moved to Spain.
Members of the grande chapelle and of the chapelle domestique also
provided performances of secular music, such as the above-mentioned Myn
hert, the only Dutch-language song in Margaret's chansonnier. It was
a highly popular song, judging by the many arrangements made for lute
(Judenkonig, Newsidler, Phalesius). The song is in ABA form, but the relation
between the prosody of the Dutch text and the music suggest that the original
version may well have been in French. In any case there is a three-voice
version of the song (Celle que j'ay) by the almost completely unknown
composer Cornelis Rigo de Bergis, probably a native of Bergen-op-Zoom or of
Mons (Dutch: Bergen) in Hainaut. Unfortunately, in the version found in the
so-called Basevi codex (Florence, Biblioteca del Conservatorio, Basevi
2439), a fairly early manuscript that can be attributed to a predecessor of
Alamire's, Martin Bourgeois, only the text incipit survives, so that we must be
content with an instrumental performance. However, the musical resemblance to
the Dutch song is striking.
The central place of
extreme melancholy in the chansonnier is typified by Soubz ce tumbel by
Pierre de la Rue, an epitaphe de l'amant vert on a text by Margaret's
court poet, Jean Lemaire de Belges. It is an intense farewell to Margaret's
'green lover', a parrot. The same sort of grief is exuded by both Plaine de
deuil by Josquin Desprez, masterfully constructed upon a canon in the tenor
part, and by Dulces exuviae, composed by the first court chaplain to
Philip the Fair and Archduke Charles, and included in both the chansonnier (MS
228) and the Basevi codex. This composition sets the last words of the
dying Dido, a text that was highly prized at the Burgundian-Habsburg court and
which spread from there to other allied royal courts, such as that of Henry
VIII. The corpus of Alamire manuscripts includes versions by Josquin,
Mouton, Ghiselin, and two anonymous composers.
Besides singers
(including both adults and around six boys) and a court organist (Henri
Bredemers), the court also had at its disposal a maximum of twelve trumpeters
as well as a number of menestrels who were responsible for the
performance of the instrumental music. Both intimate ensembles of instruments
bas (lute, viol, and keyboard) and louder groups of instruments hauts (sackbuts,
shawms, and crumhorns) played introvert, melancholy music next to more
extrovert pieces. In order to find examples of such works, we have had to
search beyond the confines of the sources produced by Alamire and his studio: a
manuscript from southern Germany (Vienna, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek,
MS 18810), that once belonged to the influential Fugger family, shows clear
links with the Habsburg court. This collection comprises a number of spirited
works (such as Maudit soyt by Heinrich Isaac), as well as the only
preserved composition by Alamire himself, a five-voice instrumental piece
written expressly for crumhorns and based on the Dutch song, Tandernaken op
den Rijn, in which two girls exchange views on love. In this ingenious
composition we can hear the composer behind this calligrapher, a man who
brought the most beautiful examples of the polyphony of the Low Countries into
the realm of the most powerful figures of his day.
Eugeeu Schreurs
Alamire Foundation,
K.U. Leuven
Translation: Stratton
Bull
Polyphonic treasures
from the Alamire scriptorium