The year 2021 will mark the 500th anniversary of the birth of Philippe de Monte. This Flemish Renaissance master was one of the greatest composers of his generation. He held the prestigious position of Hofkapellmeister to the Imperial Court for thirty-five years, first in Vienna and then in Prague. He composed more music than any other composer during the second half of the sixteenth century, producing close to eight hundred works; these included secular and sacred madrigals; forty chansons, forty masses, two hundred and fifty motets, and a handful of other sacred works.

The year 2021 will mark the 500th anniversary of the birth of Philippe de Monte. This Flemish Renaissance master was one of the greatest composers of his generation. He held the prestigious position of Hofkapellmeister to the Imperial Court for thirty-five years, first in Vienna and then in Prague. He composed more music than any other composer during the second half of the sixteenth century, producing close to eight hundred works; these included secular and sacred madrigals; forty chansons, forty masses, two hundred and fifty motets, and a handful of other sacred works. His compositions were published and distributed in all the important musical centres of Europe; contemporary records show that they were performed from Lisbon to Danzig and from Naples to Dublin. Whilst he was much appreciated within contemporary professional circles throughout his career, the attention paid to him by musicologists and his resultant appreciation by today’s music lovers is not at all in proportion to the great reputation he enjoyed during his lifetime. This selection of madrigals, motets and chansons is a contribution to the restoration of his much-merited fame.

Most likely belonging to the fourth generation of Flemish polyphonists — that of such musicians as Adrian Willaert, Nicolas Gombert, Clemens non Papa and Cipriano de Rore — Josquin (or Johannes?) Baston was one of the many mysterious figures in sixteenth-century music history. Nothing is known about when and where he was born or died, and much uncertainty exists even about his first name. Many of his compositions appeared in printed anthologies alongside those of some of the most important musicians of the first half of the sixteenth century, such as Josquin Desprez and Orlande de Lassus. For the famous printers Tielman Susato and Pierre Phalèse to have included Baston’s works among those of such luminaries of Flemish Renaissance polyphony, they must have considered him to be an excellent composer. Whether Josquin Baston stayed in his native area, or whether he was the same person as the Joannes Baston who was active in Vienna, Poland, and Scandinavia, will remain an open question. This recording of chansons and motets by Josquin Baston explores the fascinating world of the mid-sixteenth-century Flemish style through the output of a very important though largely forgotten composer.