The Divine Orlande De Lassus Part 1

Program: #86-13   Air Date: Mar 23, 1986

A dance published in Paris in 1530 by Pierra Attaignant and performed by the Capella Antiqua of Munich... music from the time of the birth of the boy who would become the greatest composer of the 2nd half of the 16th century. I'm Robert Aubry Davis, and this week on Millennium of Music, we'll examine how this boy, Roland de Lassus, became not only so famous that he was given the Italian name of Orlando di Lasso and the Latinized name of Orlandus Lassus, but also how he is emblematic of the history of Renaissance music... how musicians came from the fertile Franco-Flemish lands and crossed the Alps to become the altremontagni, the ones from the other side of the mountains who brought musical fertility to the city states of Italy.

Since the 14th century, ambassadors to the north not only fufilled diplomatic missions, but were the talent scouts to the great courts— they would write back extolling the virtues of a local boy in the parish church, and a reperesentative of the great ducal family back in Italy would ride forth to hear and perhaps buy the services of that boy.

Thus, in the summer of 1544, the fierce cadet of Mantua Ferrante Gonzaga, who also served the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, rode north to visit the loamy soil of Hainault in what is modern day Belgium. Passing the wheat and linen fields, he would have known the legendary metal workers the town of Mons — they sold the largest cannon ever made a century before to defend the city of Edinburgh— a cannon that the Scots nicknamed Mons Meg... but his mind was on the reports of a boy whose voice inspired the Mantuan ambassador in Mons to write home and send someone to hear... a voice of such beauty that the legend soon sprang up that young Roland was kidnapped three times for the glory of his voice... let's hear three more dances from the 1530 Attaignant collection played by lutetnist Andra Keckes, which were very possible played by Ferrante Gonzaga's own lutenist as they caught sight of the spire of the cathedral of St. Nicholas coming into Mons.