Nicolas Payen

Nicolas Payen (* around 1512 in Soignies ; † February 1559 in Brussels ) was a Franco-Flemish composer and conductor of the Renaissance .

Live and act

According to the Belgian music researcher François-Joseph Fétis (1784–1871), Nicolas Payen received his earliest musical training at the Church of St. Vincent in his hometown. He is then likely 1522-1529 choirboy in the capilla flamenca by Emperor Charles V was. His name appears from 1525 in the benefice lists of the communities in Mons and Gorinchem . After his voice broke , however, he could have continued his musical training at a place he was not familiar with because there was no information about him for the next five years. The imperial court has had him on the payroll again since 1534. After Empress Isabella of Portugal , the wife of Charles V, died on May 1, 1539 at the age of 36, Payen wrote the musical elegy "Carole cur defles" ("Karl, why are you crying") on her death. From 1540 he worked in this court chapel as clerc d'oratoire and chapelain des hautes messes . In 1548, during the “ Augsburger Interim ”, a collection of motets ( anthology ) with the title “Ab eximiis et praestantibus Caesarea Maiestatis Capellae musicis” appeared in Augsburg ; Here, among the authors Cornelius Canis (around 1506 - 1561), Thomas Crécquillon (around 1508 - 1557) and Jean Lestainnier , the name of Nicolas Payen is also listed. The esteem of the imperial court for him also results from his appointment as court conductor in 1556, after Canis resigned from this office in 1555. When Charles V abdicated in October 1555, his son Philip II , King of Spain, succeeded him. Payen then entered his service as court conductor. In 1558 he was appointed canon at the collegiate church in Tournai . A year later the composer died in Brussels at the end of February 1559 and was buried on March 6th of that year in the cemetery of the local church of St. Gudula.

meaning

The surviving work by Nicolas Payen is not very extensive, but according to the unanimous statement of musicologists it is of high quality. Twelve motets and six chansons have survived under his name, all of which appeared in collections between 1538 and 1554, with the exception of the motet "Nunc dimittis". His motets are close to Josquin's style , mainly because of his use of pairs of voices and the typically transparent contrapuntal spelling, e.g. B. in the aforementioned motet “Carole cur defles”. On the other hand, his style also shows similarities with his contemporaries Nicolas Gombert and Jacobus Clemens non Papa . The chansons by Nicolas Payen are stylistically hardly based on the Dutch tradition of the time, but much more on the Parisian chanson type by Claudin de Sermisy , e.g. B. the chansons "Fringottes jeunes fillettes", "Il ya de lognon" and "Je ne me puis tenir". In some of his works an expressive treatment of the text can also be observed, e.g. B. in the aforementioned elegiac motet on the death of Empress Isabella.

Works

• Motets, published in Augsburg from 1548
  • “Benedictus Dominus” for five votes, 1554
  • "Carole cur defles" to four votes, 1545 on the death of Queen Isabella
  • “Confitemur dilecta nostra” for four voices, 1548
  • “Convertemini ad me” for four voices, 1548
  • “Domine demonstrasti mihi” to four votes, 1548
  • “Domine Deus salutis” for four votes, 1548
  • “Eripe me de inimicis” to four voices, 1554
  • “In God I believe that he has” to four votes, 1544
  • “Nisi quuia Dominus” for four voices, 1553
  • “Nunc dimittis” to four voices
  • "Quis dabit capiti" for four voices, 1547 (state motet)
  • “Resurrectio Christi” for four votes, 1548
• Chansons, published from 1538
  • “Avecque vous” for four voices, 1544
  • "Fringottes jeune fillettes" for four voices, 1538, lutes - intabulation 1546
  • “Hau de par Dieu” to four votes, 1538
  • "Il ya de lognon" for four voices, 1538, lute intabulation 1548
  • “Je ne me puis tenir” to four votes, 1543

Literature (selection)

• A. Dunning: The State Motette 1480–1555 , Utrecht 1979
• I. Bossuyt: Nicolas Payen, el ain desconocido maestro de capilla de Carlos V y Felipe II , in: La Capilla Real de los Austrias. Musica y ritual de corte en la Europa moderna, edited by JJ Carreras and BJ García García, Madrid 2001, pages 175–191
• A. Dunning: Payen, Nicolas , in: The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians , Macmillan, London 2001
• E. Schroers / K. van Wonterghem: Music in the Accounts of the Church Fabric of St Goedele in Brussels in the 16th Century , in: Revue Belge de Musicologie / Belgisch Tijdschrift voor Muziekwetenschap No. 57, 2003, pages 59-85

Web links

• Sheet music in the public domain by Nicolas Payen in the Choral Public Domain Library - ChoralWiki (English)

swell

1. ↑ The music in past and present (MGG), person part volume 13, Bärenreiter and Metzler, Kassel and Basel 2005, ISBN 3-7618-1133-0
2. ^ The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, Macmillan Publishers, London 2001 et seq