Josquin

by David Fallows

A great deal of research over the past forty years has had an impact Josquin's most of his works are now available in high-quality recordings that make them easily familiar to any researcher, and the main sources have been far more thoroughly explored. Furthermore, new biographical findings, particularly within the last ten years, have shown that much of what was written about Josquin's life was based on documents that concerned other people entirely. For example, Josquin's birthdate has been advanced by more than ten years, with major consequences for our view not only of his music and its chronology, but also of most other music of the time. This book assembles and assesses the newly available material. It builds the main works into the narrative of Josquin's life. Appendices include a critical listing of the documents about Josquin, a summary of later literary references to him, summaries of the relevant information about the main figures mentioned in the book, a list of other musicians at the time named 'Josquin' or something similar (35 of them!), and much more.

Genres: Music, Biography

522 pages, Hardcover

First published May 29, 2009

Reviews

[Carol · Rating 4 out of 5]

Before I get to the meat of this review, I do have to say something about the book itself, as a physical object. Clearly, the publisher went out of its way to make this book a Serious Tome (tm). It was approximately A4 sized, and, while not the thickest book in terms of number of pages and measurable width, it is one of the heaviest Ive ever had to deal with. The covers were thick board covered with stiff fabric and the pages were of a heavy glossy paper like that found in fine art books (and there were only four pages of color illustrations, so there was no real need to use such paper throughout the entire book). As one review I read stated, "I could hardly put the book down. I could also barely raise it up". Despite the cumbersome format, I really did enjoy the book as much as that reviewer did.
This lengthy and very scholarly biography of Renaissance composer Josquin Des Prez was surprisingly fun to read. Fallows writes in a learned yet conversational tone that very much drew me into the story he was telling and the picture he was painting. I also enjoyed his discussions of Josquin's music, which were always paired with useful musical examples. It was obvious how much Fallows loves this music, and his enthusiasm for it made me love it even more myself.
Josquin is a little different from traditional composer biographers, in ways which really appealed to my nerdier side. Because Josquin Des Pres lived from about 1455 to 1521, the documentary evidence regarding his life is really thin and spotty. Thus, Fallows included discussions of this documentation as he discussed the events and outlines of Josquin's life, explaining not just the content of the extant records, but also the context and various issues involved as well. I ended up not only with a better sense of Josquin's life and music but also a really good perspective on the business of musicology.

[Nick Bentz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fallows’s book ‘Josquin’ really presents a quandary: how do you compose a narrative of anyone during a time when documentation was so scarce, the preservation of musical scores a burgeoning practice, and the institution of classical music in its embryonic stage (if that). This book is compellingly structured and one of the most rigorous pieces of scholarship I’ve gone through, analyzing every scrap of paper that has survived to today that references Josquin in an attempt to paint a picture of the first great composer of the European continent. The discussions of Josquin’s music are well-handled and not jargon-laden, which was a relief as I know renaissance music studies can quickly devolve into language games if not reigned in. This book is also just published in an excellent form - an ideal tome, and a book that I will assuredly return to in due time. No other book frames Josquin the human around what scant evidence we have more eloquently.