Tielman Susato

Het ierste en tweetste musyck boexken – The first and second music booklet

Double album

A scorned lover sings about his distress, it was a recurrent theme in the 16th century. This lover’s lament is not of a personal nature though. During that time, this kind of song was written by popular demand, with various poets (who, moreover, wished to remain anonymous) competing with each other through complex and stylized interventions.

The first and second music booklet or ‘Musyck Boexken’ by the publisher Tielman Susato contains a total of 55 polyphonic orchestrations for this kind of text. About half of the composers of these ‘madrigals’ are anonymous. The remainder of the pieces can be attributed to about eleven composers, the most famous of whom is Clemens non Papa.

Both books are performed in their entirety by Egidius Kwartet, joined by soprano Katelijne Van Laethem, tenor Paul van den Bemt, Egidius Consort, Oltremontano and cornett player Josué Meléndez. This is an extremely important recording, given the fact that these books constitute the most important source of the Dutch polyphonic genre.