Heinrich Isaac

Britannica Concise Encyclopedia: Heinrich Isaac

(born c. 1450, Brabant — died 1517, Florence) Flemish composer. He spent much of his career in Italy, especially Florence, but was known as a leading representative of the Netherlandish style. As court composer to Emperor Maximilian I (from 1497), he was allowed to travel. He had many students, including Ludwig Senfl, and his historical importance in Germany is as the main disseminator of the progressive Northern style there. The beauty and quality of his works, which include over 100 masses, dozens of motets, and secular songs, have led some to regard him as second only to Josquin des Prez among his contemporaries.

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Music Encyclopedia: Heinrich Isaac

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(b Flanders, c 1450; d Florence, 26 March 1517). Flemish composer. Though he was born in Flanders, no references to him there are known; the earliest (1484) concerns an apparent journey south, through Innsbruck, to Italy. Serving the Medici in Florence, 1485-93, he sang at the cathedral and probably taught Lorenzo the Magnificent's children. From 1496 he worked intermittently in Vienna, Torgau, Konstanz and Florence, notably as court composer to the Habsburg Emperor Maximilian I. From 1514 he remained in Florence, holding both a Medici pension and a diplomatic post under Maximilian.

Isaac's works reflect his knowledge of the distinctions among Netherlands, Italian and German musical practices; he adapted well to local tradition wherever he found himself. Half his nearly 40 settings of the Mass Ordinary, for example, use ‘foreign’ borrowed material (e.g. secular songs) and imaginative cyclic structures in accordance with Netherlands-Italian practice, while the other half (dating from after 1496) use plainchant and more conservative, self-contained structures, often with unison sections. The German style is found above all in his nearly 100 settings of the Proper, especially in the posthumous three-volume collection Choralis constantinus, written for the Habsburg court chapel and for Konstanz. His secular works include imitative chansons and homophonic frottolas as well as German Tenorlieder (Isbruck, ich muss dich lassen is famous for the lyricism of its polyphony). In quality and scope Isaac's works stand beside those of Obrecht, Compère, Agricola and La Rue as some of the finest of the Josquin period; his influence, through his music and his pupil Senfl, was particularly important in Germany.

works:
Sacred music

36 masses
15 mass movts 99 cycles of mass Propers
over 30 other mass Propers
over 40 free motets

Secular music

c 80 songs: German lieder, incl. Isbruck, ich muss dich lessen
French chansons
Italian frottolas

Biography: Heinrich Isaac

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Heinrich Isaac (ca. 1450-1517) was a versatile and prolific Flemish composer of both secular and church music. He was one of the greatest masters of High Renaissance music.

Little is known of the early life of Heinrich Isaac. He asserted that he came from Flanders. His birth date is believed to be within a few years of the mid-15th century. He was undoubtedly trained in the Low Countries and remained there until 1484, when Lorenzo de' Medici, impressed by his reputation, invited Isaac to Florence. For 10 years he worked at the principal churches of the city as composer, singer, and choir director.

Isaac was also a composer for the Medici household and taught music to Lorenzo's children. During this decade he composed many carnival songs (now lost) to the poems of his wealthy patron. With the fall of the Medici and their expulsion from Florence (1494), Isaac lost his posts and was obliged to seek employment with the Hapsburgs at Vienna and Innsbruck. He did, however, maintain a house in Florence until his death, partly because he loved the city and partly in deference to his Florentine wife.

In 1496 Emperor Maximilian of Austria appointed Isaac imperial court composer at Vienna, a title he retained for the rest of his life. His church music for the German liturgy as well as his German songs all probably date from this time. As court composer he was required only to furnish the court and chapel with musical compositions; continuous attendance on the monarch was not required, so the composer lived far from Vienna for many years. Maximilian also seems not to have objected to Isaac's composing for other rulers or civic authorities while on the imperial payroll. Isaac received payments from the Elector of Saxony (1497-1500) and wrote music for the Duke of Ferrara (1503-1505). A commission from the German city of Constance in 1508 produced a monumental series of polyphonic Mass Propers (Introits, Alleluias, Sequences, Communions) for feast days celebrated in the city. These pieces, together with other Mass Propers by Isaac, were published posthumously in three volumes as the Choralis Constantinus (1550-1555).

In 1512 the Medici returned to Florence, and a year later Giovanni de' Medici, Isaac's former student, ascended the papal throne as Leo X. Isaac thereupon requested papal assistance for reinstatement to his former positions at Florence. When these negotiations were successfully completed in 1514, Isaac journeyed north for release from further obligations to his imperial master. With characteristic magnanimity Emperor Maximilian permitted the composer to return to Florence without loss of salary and, in effect, gave him a pension to enjoy his last days in Italy. Several months after drawing up his final (third) last will and testament, Isaac died in Florence on March 26, 1517.

Isaac's music owes much to the Netherlandish style he learned in his homeland. Among his more conservative traits is a persistent allegiance to the traditional cantus firmus. He wrote fewer pieces without a borrowed tune than many contemporaries who were then moving more toward free composition. Among the progressive features of his style is his use of imitation and melodic and rhythmic equality of voice parts. Intricate canons and notational artifices are occasionally found in the Masses, but they almost always serve a musical purpose. Similarly, Isaac's melodic lines may sometimes look intricate and fussy, but they never sound so to the exclusion of their musical interest. That he was a great melodist is shown by his song Innsbruck ich muss dich lassen, a tune destined to have a strong influence on the later German song.

Unlike some of his contemporaries, Isaac was equally adept at writing religious and secular music: German, French, and Italian songs; instrumental pieces; Masses for four to six voices and Propers for the entire church year; separate Credos; and motets. He had the rare ability to assimilate different national styles and yet preserve his own idiom.

Biography

While Josquin Desprez is unquestionably the major figure of the middle Renaissance period, there are many other outstanding names that deserve attention. Above all, the music of Heinrich Isaac -- another exceptionally versatile composer of the Franco-Flemish school -- stands out from this particularly rich period of musical composition.

Born some ten years after Josquin, Isaac (ca. 1450-1517) is likewise a composer whose early life remains obscure. After 1480 he is known to have been in Florence in the service of Lorenzo the Magnificent, a member of the powerful ruling Medici family; Lorenzo was responsible for Isaac's appointment as organist of the cathedral. Following the fall of the Medicis in 1497, he was appointed court composer to the Emperor Maximilian I in Vienna and Innsbruck, but his heart remained in Florence, to where he made frequent return journeys before finally settling there three years before his death in 1517.

Isaac was typical of his time in his travels to and from Italy, and his large body of compositions reflects to an unusual degree the cosmopolitan nature of the international Franco-Flemish school of the age; his secular works show him to have been equally at ease with German, Italian or French song. The Italian songs are strongly influenced by the frottola, a kind of simple, light song that largely avoided polyphony in favor of catchy dance rhythms. Many of them were doubtless composed for the frequent Florentine carnivals; their relatively small number is likely due to the religious fanatic Savonarola's wholesale destruction of "profane" repertoire in the aftermath of the downfall of the Medicis. One such Isaac song, "Ne più bella di queste," celebrates the city that held such an inescapable fascination for him; it ends with the words, "all the earth sings and laughs in Florence and says Florence is paradise." Among Isaac's German songs, "Innsbruck, ich muss dich lassen" is perhaps the best known; it too is simple in style, with predominantly homophonic writing and an elegant melancholy that looks forward to the era of the madrigal.

Depending on which authority one consults, Isaac is said to have composed anything between ten and thirty masses, a discrepancy that significantly illustrates just how little attention has so far been devoted to this aspect of his work. In contrast to those of most of his contemporaries, many of Isaac's sacred works employ a rich six-part palette, a format he adopted in the Missa de Apostolis. This is one of the masses composed during Isaac's service at Maximilian's court, and, in common with Austrian practice at the time, it omits a polyphonic setting of the Credo, and alternates polyphony with plainsong in the remaining sections of the Ordinary. Despite such telescoping it is an expansive work, amply demonstrating the composer's love of contrasting sonorities, long melodic lines, and -- when compared with Josquin -- less tightly organized polyphony. During a sojourn in Konstanz around 1507, Isaac began the composition of a huge cycle of Mass Propers; these appear in the monumental three-volume Choralis Constantinus, the first known integral set of music for the propers for the whole ecclesiastical year. On Isaac's death his student Ludwig Senfl set about completing it; it was not published until 1555.

~ Brian Robins, All Music Guide

Wikipedia: Heinrich Isaac

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Illuminated chansonnier by Heinrich Isaac, showing the beginning of his four-voice motet Palle, palle; probably written in Florence in the 1480s and copied during that period. Palle (Italian for "balls") is a reference to the coat-of arms of the Medici family, his employers at the time.

Heinrich Isaac (also known as Ysaac, Ysaak, Henricus, Arrigo d'Ugo, and Arrigo il Tedesco – Tedesco meaning "Flemish" or "German" in Italian) (around 1450-55 – March 26, 1517) was a Franco-Flemish composer of the Renaissance, of south Netherlandish origin. He is regarded as one of the most significant contemporaries of Josquin des Prez, and had an especially large influence on the subsequent development of music in Germany.

1 Early life
2 Career
3 Compositions
4 Influence
5 Media
6 Recordings
7 References
8 Notes
9 External links

Early life

Little is known about Isaac's early life (or indeed his real name), but it is probable that he was born in Flanders, likely in Brabant. During the late 15th century, standards of music education in the region were excellent, and he likely was educated in his homeland, although the location is not known.^[1]^[2] Sixteenth-century Swiss music theorist and writer Heinrich Glarean claimed Isaac for Germany by dubbing him "Henricus Isaac Germanus", but in his will Isaac called himself "Ugonis de Flandria". A writer in the Milanese Revista critica della literatura italiana, June 1886, speculated that this 'Hugo' might be connected to 'Huygens' and discovered the name "Isaacke" in the town archives of Bruges.

Career

Isaac was writing music by the mid 1470s, and the first documentary reference to him is from 1484, when he was court composer at Innsbruck for Duke Sigismund of Austria, of the House of Habsburg. The following year, he entered the service of Lorenzo de' Medici at Florence, where he served first as a singer in the church of San Giovanni. Previously Isaac had been identified as an organist to Lorenzo; however, the Isaac who served at this post is now known to have been Isaac Argyropoulos.^[3] Isaac later became part of the informal collection of musicians which Lorenzo maintained as part of his household, and he was likely the teacher to Lorenzo's children; he assumed this post on the death of Antonio Squarcialupi. One of his students in Florence was the future Pope Leo X. When Lorenzo died in 1492, his son Piero became Isaac's employer. Piero took his musicians, including Isaac, to Rome in September 1492, to perform for Pope Alexander VI on the occasion of his coronation.^[3] In 1494, the Medici were banished from Florence; the era of Savonarola was beginning, and Isaac was left to find employment elsewhere. However, he had married a Florentine, Bartolomea Bello, a marriage probably arranged by Lorenzo himself. The couple apparently had no children.^[3]

Isaac moved to Vienna in 1496.^[4] By November of that year, Isaac was in the employ of Emperor Maximilian I^[5]. Isaac was the court composer for Maximilian at his new chapel in Vienna April 3, 1497^[3] He travelled widely in Germany, to Augsburg, Wels, Innsbruck, and Nuremberg, and is credited with having a big influence on German composers of the time.^[6] Isaac was a singer at Ss. Annunziata until 1493.^[7] In 1502, he returned to Italy, going to Florence and then Ferrara at the Este court of Ferrara, where he competed with Josquin for employment: a famous letter from the agent of the Este family compared the two composers, saying that "Isaac is of a better nature than Josquin, and while it is true that Josquin is a better composer, he only composes when he wants to, and not when asked; Isaac will compose when you want him to." In 1507 he was in Konstanz for the crowning of Maximilian as the Holy Roman Emperor and wrote two ceremonial motets for the occasion. ^[8]

Isaac returned to Florence in 1514. By December 1516, he had become ill and died not long after, on 26 March 1517 in Florence.^[9]

Compositions

Isaac was one of the most prolific composers of the time, producing an extraordinarily diverse output, including almost all the forms and styles current at the time; only Lassus, at the end of the 16th century, had a wider overall range.^[10] Music composed by Isaac included masses, motets, songs in French, German, and Italian, as well as instrumental music. His best known work may be the lied Innsbruck, ich muss dich lassen, of which he made at least two versions. It is possible, however, that the melody itself is not by Isaac, and only the setting is original.^[11] The same melody was later used as the theme for the Lutheran chorale O Welt, ich muss dich lassen, which was the basis of works by Johann Sebastian Bach and Johannes Brahms.

Of his settings of the ordinary of the mass, 36 survive; others are believed to have been lost. Numerous individual movements of masses survive as well. But it is composition of music for the Proper of the Mass – the portion of the liturgy which changed on different days, unlike the ordinary, which remained constant – which gave him his greatest fame. The huge cycle of motets which he wrote for the mass Proper, the Choralis Constantinus, and which he left incomplete at his death, would have supplied music for 100 separate days of the year.^[3]

Isaac is held in high regard for his Choralis Constantinus. It is a huge anthology of over 450 chant-based polyphonic motets for the Proper of the Mass. It had its origins in a commission that Isaac received from the Cathedral in Konstanz, Germany in April of 1508 to set many of the Propers unique to the local liturgy. Isaac was in Konstanz because Maximilian had called a meeting of the Reichstag (German Parliament of nobles) there and Isaac was on hand to provide music for the Imperial court chapel choir. After the deaths of both Maximilian and Isaac, Ludwig Senfl, who had been Isaac's pupil as a member of the Imperial court choir, gathered all the Isaac settings of the Proper and placed them into liturgical order for the church year. But the anthology was not published until 1555, after Senfl's death by which time the reforms of the Council of Trent had made many of the texts obsolete. The motets remain some of the finest examples of chant-based Renaissance polyphony in existence.

Isaac composed a 6-voice motet Angeli Archangeli for the Feast of All Saint’s Day, honoring angels, archangels, and all other saints.^[12] Another famous motet by Isaac is Optime pastor (Optime divino), written for the accession to the papacy of Medici pope Leo X.^[13] This motet compares the Pope to a shepherd capable of soothing all of his flock and binding them together.

While in the service of the Medici in Florence, Isaac wrote a lament on the death of Lorenzo de' Medici, Quis dabit capiti meo aquam (1492), which set words by Lorenzo's favorite poet, Angelo Poliziano.^[3]

Influence

The influence of Isaac was especially pronounced in Germany, due to the connection he maintained with the Habsburg court. He was the first significant master of the Franco-Flemish polyphonic style who both lived in German-speaking areas, and whose music was widely distributed there. It was through him that the polyphonic style of the Netherlanders became widely accepted in Germany, making possible the further development of contrapuntal music there.

Media

Innsbruck, ich muss dich lassen midi sequence (help·info)

Innsbruck, ich muss dich lassen (introduction sample)

By Heinrich Isaac, performed by Capilla Flamenca

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A la battaglia (introduction sample)

By Heinrich Isaac, performed Capilla Flamenca

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Recordings

1996 - Oh Flanders Free. Music of the Flemish Renaissance: Ockeghem, Josquin, Susato, de La Rue. Capilla Flamenca. Alamire LUB 03, Naxos 8.554516. Contains a recording of Innsbruck, ich muss dich lassen by Heinrich Isaac.
2001-Margaretha-Maximilian I, Capilla Flamenca together with La Caccia, Schola Cantorum Cantate Domino, Schola Gregoriana Lovaniensis and Joris Verdin. Orf CD 265. Contains proper chants from the Choralis Constantinus along with several pieces of secular music (among which A la battaglia).
2003 - Canticum Canticorum. In Praise of Love: The Song of Songs in the Renaissance. Capilla Flamenca. Eufoda 1359. Contains a recording of Tota pulchra es by Heinrich Isaac.

References

Reinhard Strohm: "Heinrich Isaac", Grove Music Online, ed. L. Macy (Accessed December 9, 2007), (subscription access)
Martin Staehelin: "Heinrich Isaac," The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, ed. Stanley Sadie. 20 vol. London, Macmillan Publishers Ltd., 1980. ISBN 1-56159-174-2
James D. Feiszli: "Performance Editions from Heinrich Isaac's 'Choralis Constantinus'." D.M.A. dissertation, Arizona State University, 1983.
Burn, David J. What Did Isaac Write for Constance? The Journal of Musicology: A Quarterly Review of Music History, Criticism, Analysis, and Performance Practice. Winter 2003. United States. Vol 20. p 45-72.
Picker, Martin. Isaac in Flanders: The Early Works of Henricus Isaac. From Ciconia to Sweelinck: Donum natalicium Willem Elders. 1994. Vol 28. p 153-165.
Rothenberg, David J. Angels, Archangels, and a Woman in Distress: The Meaning of Isaac’s Angeli archangeli. The Journal of Musicology: A Quarterly Review of Music History, Criticism, Analysis, and Performance Practice. Fall 2004. United States. Vol 21. p 514-578.
Slonimsky, Nicolas. ed. Kassel, Richard M. Baker’s Dictionary of Music. 1997. Prentice Hall International, London, England. Vol. 31.

Notes

^ New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. December 2001. Stanley Sadie
^ Isaac in Flanders: The Early Works of Henricus Isaac
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f Strohm, Grove online
^ Slonimsky
^ Isaac in Flounders: The Early Works of Henricus Isaac.
^ Sadie
^ Baker's Dictionary of Music. 1997. Nicolas Slonimsky
^ What Did Isaac Write for Constance? The Journal of Musicology: A quarterly review of music history, criticism, analysis, and performance practice. Winter 2003. David Burn
^ New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. December 2001. Stanley Sadie
^ Dunning, "Low Countries, I.1: Art music, Netherlands to 1600." Grove, 1980
^ Strohm, "Heinrich Isaac", Grove online
^ Angels, Archangels, and a Woman in Distress: The Meaning of Isaac’s Angeli archangeli. The journal of musicology: A quarterly review of music history, criticism, analysis, and performance practice. Fall 2004. David Rothenberg.
^ D'Accone, "Medici", Grove online

External links

Free scores by Heinrich Isaac in the Werner Icking Music Archive (WIMA)
Listen to a free recording of song from Umeå Akademiska Kör.
Free scores by Heinrich Isaac in the Choral Public Domain Library (ChoralWiki)

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