Although there are only four securely authentic motets attributed to him, Johannes Ockeghem (c.1420-1497) makes a definite impact on this style. The three settings of standard Marian texts, Alma Redemptoris mater, Ave Maria, and Salve Regina show Ockeghem's amazing array of 4-point counterpoint in what would otherwise be fairly typical settings of the era (aside from the lack of a cantus firmus in Ave Maria, also the one non-antiphon of the group). The massive 5-voice Intemerata Dei Mater uses a composite text, rather than a liturgical one, apparently put together by Ockeghem himself. It has a particularly low scoring, and an even more forceful impact, quoting motives he also used in the 5-voice mass torso Fors seulement and the 4-voice Missa Mi-Mi. Finally, Ut heremita solus is a probable work, surviving without a text, and showing some idiomatic instrumental thinking.

One year after winning the 2018 Gramophone Classical Music Award for Early Music for the fifth album in its series Music from the Peterhouse Partbooks, and just one month after releasing the world premiere recording of Cipriano de Rore’s I madrigali a cinque voci, Blue Heron announces the release of the first in a new series of recordings dedicated to the music of Johannes Ockeghem and his contemporaries. Johannes Ockeghem: Complete Songs, vol. 1 is the first of two releases which will present all of Ockeghem’s songs in a complete set; the second is planned for release in 2022. The songs have not been recorded complete since the early 1980s.

For a long time Johannes Ockeghem (ca.1420-1497) was one of the most famous Unknown Persons in music history. There is no doubt about his position as the most important representative of the second generation of Franco-Flemish composers.

Although the works of Josquin DesPrez (cl440-1521) are better known today than those of any other fifteenth-century composer, his biography remains shrouded in uncertainties. The general outlines –- his birth in the area of northern France that produced so many composers of the day, his travel to Milan, Rome and Ferrara, and then his return to the north at the end of his life - are clear. But, his connections to the Court of France, to the Provençal court of King René, to the court in Hungary, and many other details about his life remain contested or simply unknowable.

This is one of the most beautiful early music discs in the catalog–equally attributable to the music and to the perfectly tuned and blended voices, whose timbres couldn't be more appealing to the ear or more appropriate to the style of the repertoire. The very first track–a charming, gentle, hopeful little piece by Dufay, "Bon jour, bon mois, bon an"–leads us easily into the heart and spirit of this well-conceived program, which seeks to duplicate in music the expressive power and visual beauty of the richly illustrated Books of Hours–lovingly created volumes that were a cherished fixture of religious devotional practice in medieval and Renaissance Europe. Among the composers represented are Dufay, Desprez, Busnoys, Dunstaple, and Ockeghem. Put this at the top of your list.

From Ockeghem born around 1420 to Lassus dead in 1594 via Josquin des Prés, this 8-CD collection presents almost two centuries of masterworks from one of the most extraordinary musical school, that could be compared to the Italian Renaissance in architecture or painting. The Hilliard Ensemble, founded by Paul Hillier in 1974 has championed this music with all the virtues of their instantly recognizable style and with a clarity and cleanness of timbre that are matchless.

This collection of vocal music from the late 15th century is delightfully intimate. The Clerks' Group, a small ensemble specializing in a French and Flemish repertoire, perform a bright and inspiring program. Though the dates of these early pieces are somewhat in question, their timeless beauty is not. The polyphonious rondeau of Robert Morton's 'Il Sera pour Vous' combines romance and subtle humor in the tenor's chivalric rendition of Johannes Ockeghem's 'L'Homme Arm,' within the piece.

Only a few reliable biographical data have been preserved on Johannes Ockeghem: at the beginning of the 1450s, presumably between the ages of 30 and 35, he was appointed as a singer to the French royal court, where he remained until his death in 1497.

La Main Harmonique was founded to promote mediaeval and Renaissance music. The term refers to a mnemonic device which takes its name from the early theoretician, Guido d'Arezzo. One starts by feeling encouraged that yet another small, independent, group is dedicated to furthering polyphonic and solo music from the period. It doesn't take very long for that encouragement to be justified. Theirs is singing of great poise, delicacy and precision as they work their way sensitively through small-scale works from the courts of the Château de Moulins and Duke of Bourbon during the reigns of Anne and Pierre II of Beaujeu in the later fifteenth century.

Johannes Ockeghem (c1410 - 1497) was a composer who had one of the most far reaching impacts on the history of music. He was also the father of the musical form of the canon. So whether it is a canon by a modern composer, by Bach or by Pachabel - all these are but ripples of the impact that this man had on the destiny of Western music. However of all of the surviving works - there is a sadly lost 36 part mass cycle - the Missa Prolationum is the one that shows the grandiosity of his musical vision, his audacity and the genius of his mind perhaps far greater than any other.

Josquin Desprez, princeps musicorum, the prince of musicians, as his contemporaries called him, is best known today for his sacred works, the masses and motets, which have been widely performed and recorded. Surprisingly, his chansons have received little attention from performers, except for the pieces for five and six voices, printed after his death by the Antwerp publisher Tilman Susato in his seventh book of 1545. Doulce Mémoire has chosen to focus on the chansons for three and four voices, which are probably the earliest in the Hainault master’s output; with their diversity of language and themes (sometimes folk-derived), these songs constitute a varied programme that is at once serious and bawdy, a testament to the unequalled art of Josquin Desprez.

The Leuven Chansonnier (1470–75) includes not only fifty compositions by such leading 15th century Franco-Flemish names as Johannes Ockeghem, Antoine Busnoys and Firminus Caron but also twelve newly rediscovered works that exist in no other source. The Ensemble Sollazzo here brings a selection of this music to life in an interpretation that is both brilliant and refreshing. Sollazzo Ensemble was founded in 2014 in Basel and brings together musicians with a strong interest in late medieval and early renaissance repertoires. The ensemble is directed by fiddle player Anna Danilevskaia and benefits from the different musical backgrounds of its members: while some of them come from Early Music families, others have found their calling via modern classical music, theatre or even musical.

The Franco-Flemish composer, Johannes Ockeghem, sang at Antwerp at the Bourbon court before joining the French royal chapel in 1451. Ockeghem spent most of his professional life at the French chapel and his output was quite prolific. He composed 14 settings of the Mass, including one of the earliest polyphonic versions of the Requiem. Ockeghem also composed numerous motets and secular songs. He was one of the most original voices in early Renaissance polyphony and his music dazzles with its ingenuity and beauty.

Johannes Ockeghem (c. 1410-1497) stands as perhaps the greatest of the Franco-Flemish composers of the 15th century. Digitally recorded in 1992, this disc presents a world-premiere release of his two surviving 3-voice masses; Missa Sine Nomine and Missa Quinti Toni. They are presumably early works by the composer and are among his most masterful creations. Complete program notes on the works and general issues of performance practice, along with the mass texts and translations, are enclosed. Produced by Gerald Gold.

Auf »The Landscape of the Polyphonists« präsentieren das Huelgas Ensemble und Paul Van Nevel auf zwei fantastischen CDs den intensiven melancholischen und imitatorischen Stil der französisch-flämischen polyphonen Musik und erkunden, wie die Musik durch den besonderen Charakter der Landschaft, in der jeder Komponist sein Leben verbrachte, geprägt wurde. 24 ausgewählte Landschaftsaufnahmen und Bilder von flämischen Kathedralen und ihrer Umgebung versetzen den Zuhörer in die Welt der flämischen Länder der Renaissance, während das Huelgas Ensemble die Werke von außergewöhnlichen Komponisten wie Antoine Busnois, Nicholas Gombert, Josquin Desprez sowie von weniger bekannten, aber ebenso bemerkenswerten Komponisten wie Josquin Baston, Jean l’Héritier oder Jean Mouton aufführt. Das Publikum kann die komplexe Wechselwirkung zwischen historischen Landschaften, Architektur und Musik an ihren jeweiligen Herkunftsorten unmittelbar erleben.