Gaspar van Weerbeke

(c.1440 - after 1518)


Franco-Flemish composer. From 1472 he was in the service of the Sforza family in Milan, with Josquin and Compère, and he sang in the Papal choir in 1481-9 and between 1499 and 1515; in the 1490s he made a triumphal return to his native Flanders. He wrote some eight Masses, two Credos, twenty-eight motets, two motet cycles and five chansons that survive; the motet cycles were early examples of pieces intended to be substituted for the Proper of the Mass. A highly esteemed member of the Josquin generation, he wrote in an Italianate manner for an airy 4-part texture; his style shows great euphony and harmonic clarity, though he was also skilled in canon and the notational intricacies of northern music. Five of his masses were issued by Petrucci.



IVA: The Netherlanders around and after Josquin