Recording
- Pomerium, Musical Book of Hours. Archiv 289 457 586-2. Contains the five-voice motet Virgo prudentissima, published in 1534.
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Hilaire Penet (born 1501?) was a French composer of the Renaissance, who worked for at least the earlier part of his life in Rome.
Unusually for a Renaissance composer, more is known of his earlier life than his later; indeed nothing at all is known of him after 1520. He was probably born in 1501, since his age is given as 14 in a document of 1515, and he was probably born near Poitiers. He served as a singer in the papal chapel from 1514, when he arrived there in the care of Carpentras, until 1520 when he left never to return. Since much of his music was published in the 1530s and later, he may have still been alive then and working elsewhere; presumably had he been still working in association with the papal chapel, there would be records of his employment.
Penet is most famous as the composer of Descendit angelus Domini, a four-voice motet which was used both by Palestrina and Costanzo Porta as source material for mass composition. The motet circulated widely in Europe and apparently was quite popular; Penet can be seen as a kind of Renaissance one-hit wonder on the strength and popularity of this refined, elegant composition. He also wrote two settings of the Magnificat which have survived, another motet (Virgo prudentissima), as well as a handful of secular chansons, all of which are settings of current popular tunes.
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Josquin Lebloitte dit des Prez was a composer of High Renaissance music, who is variously described as French or Franco-Flemish. Considered one of the greatest composers of the Renaissance, he was a central figure of the Franco-Flemish School and had a profound influence on the music of 16th-century Europe. Building on the work of his predecessors Guillaume Du Fay and Johannes Ockeghem, he developed a complex style of expressive—and often imitative—movement between independent voices (polyphony) which informs much of his work. He further emphasized the relationship between text and music, and departed from the early Renaissance tendency towards lengthy melismatic lines on a single syllable, preferring to use shorter, repeated motifs between voices. Josquin was a singer, and his compositions are mainly vocal. They include masses, motets and secular chansons.
Heinrich Isaac was a Netherlandish composer of south Netherlandish origin during the Renaissance era. He wrote masses, motets, songs, and instrumental music. A significant contemporary of Josquin des Prez, Isaac influenced the development of music in Germany. Several variants exist of his name: Ysaac, Ysaak, Henricus, Arrigo d'Ugo, and Arrigo il Tedesco among them.
Ottaviano Petrucci was an Italian printer. His Harmonice Musices Odhecaton, a collection of chansons printed in 1501, is commonly misidentified as the first book of sheet music printed from movable type. Actually that distinction belongs to the Roman printer Ulrich Han's Missale Romanum of 1476. Nevertheless, Petrucci's later work was extraordinary for the complexity of his white mensural notation and the smallness of his font, and he did in fact print the first book of polyphony using movable type. He also published numerous works by the most highly regarded composers of the Renaissance, including Josquin des Prez and Antoine Brumel.
John Taverner was an English composer and organist, regarded as one of the most important English composers of his era. He is best-known for Missa Gloria tibi Trinitas and The Western Wynde Mass, and Missa Corona Spinea is also often viewed as a masterwork.
Adrian Willaert was a Flemish composer of High Renaissance music. Mainly active in Italy, he was the founder of the Venetian School. He was one of the most representative members of the generation of northern composers who moved to Italy and transplanted the polyphonic Franco-Flemish style there.
Antoine Brumel was a French composer. He was one of the first renowned French members of the Franco-Flemish school of the Renaissance, and, after Josquin des Prez, was one of the most influential composers of his generation.
Jacques Arcadelt was a Franco-Flemish composer of the Renaissance, active in both Italy and France, and principally known as a composer of secular vocal music. Although he also wrote sacred vocal music, he was one of the most famous of the early composers of madrigals; his first book of madrigals, published within a decade of the appearance of the earliest examples of the form, was the most widely printed collection of madrigals of the entire era. In addition to his work as a madrigalist, and distinguishing him from the other prominent early composers of madrigals – Philippe Verdelot and Costanzo Festa – he was equally prolific and adept at composing chansons, particularly late in his career when he lived in Paris.
Costanzo Festa was an Italian composer of the Renaissance. While he is best known for his madrigals, he also wrote sacred vocal music. He was the first native Italian polyphonist of international renown, and with Philippe Verdelot, one of the first to write madrigals, in the infancy of that most popular of all sixteenth-century Italian musical forms.
Pierre de la Rue was a Franco-Flemish composer and singer of the Renaissance. His name also appears as Piersson or variants of Pierchon and his toponymic, when present, as various forms of de Platea, de Robore, or de Vico. A member of the same generation as Josquin des Prez, and a long associate of the Habsburg-Burgundian musical chapel, he ranks with Agricola, Brumel, Compère, Isaac, Obrecht, and Weerbeke as one of the most famous and influential composers in the Netherlands polyphonic style in the decades around 1500.
Loyset Compère was a Franco-Flemish composer of the Renaissance. Of the same generation as Josquin des Prez, he was one of the most significant composers of motets and chansons of that era, and one of the first musicians to bring the light Italianate Renaissance style to France.
Giovanni Animuccia was an Italian composer of the Renaissance who was involved in the heart of Rome's liturgical musical life. He was one of Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina's most important predecessors and possibly his mentor. As maestro di capella of St Philip Neri's Oratory and the Capella Giulia at St Peter's, he was composing music at the very center of the Roman Catholic Church, during the turbulent reforms of the Counter-Reformation and as part of the new movements that began to flourish around the middle of the century. His music reflects these changes.
Jean Mouton was a French composer of the Renaissance. He was famous both for his motets, which are among the most refined of the time, and for being the teacher of Adrian Willaert, one of the founders of the Venetian School.
Gaspar van Weerbeke was a Netherlandish composer of the Renaissance. He was of the same generation as Josquin des Prez, but unique in his blending of the contemporary Italian style with the older Burgundian style of Dufay.
Claudin de Sermisy was a French composer of the Renaissance. Along with Clément Janequin he was one of the most renowned composers of French chansons in the early 16th century; in addition he was a significant composer of sacred music. His music was both influential on, and influenced by, contemporary Italian styles.
Jean L'Héritier was a French composer of the Renaissance. He was mainly famous as a composer of motets, and is representative of the generation of composers active in the early to middle 16th century who anticipated the style of Palestrina.
Lupus Hellinck was a Flemish composer of the Renaissance. He was a prominent composer of masses, as well as German chorales and motets. Although he was a Roman Catholic all of his life, his music shows evidence of sympathy for the Protestant Reformation, and three of his motets—including a famous setting of In te domine speravi—were probably inspired by the prison writings of the martyred reformer Girolamo Savonarola.
Antonius Divitis was a Flemish composer of the Renaissance, of the generation slightly younger than Josquin des Prez. He was important in the development of the parody mass.
Andrea Antico was a music printer, editor, publisher and composer of the Renaissance born in the Republic of Venice, of Istrian birth, active in Rome and in Venice. He was the first printer of sacred music in Rome, and the earliest competitor of Venetian Ottaviano Petrucci, who is regarded as the first significant music printer.
The first decade of the 16th century marked the creation of some significant compositions. These were to become some of the most famous compositions of the century.
Nicolas Payen was a Franco-Flemish composer and choirmaster of the Renaissance, associated with the Grande Chapelle, the Habsburg imperial chapel, at the end of the reign of Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor.
