Jacques Arcadelt – Six Psalmes… (1559)

Jacopo Pontormo, Portrait of an unknown lute player, c. 1529 (Florence, court of the Medici). NB: No portrait of Arcadelt is known. The Chamber Choir of Namur suggested this portrait as ‘possible’ in their CD box dedicated to ‘their Arcadelt’. Time and place are approximately correct. Nothing more.

research question of this essay: How to exlain that a composer who worked in the service of popes and cardinals, also published a music booklet in 1559 with 6 polyphonic settings of French Psalms (using the Geneva melody).The short answer: It is not at all surprising. Every self-respecting composer in that period ventured into such settings, not just those who were sympathetic to Calvin. They were seen (sung) as general French cultural heritage of high value: texts by Clément Marot, and melodies by Guillaume Franc and Loys Bourgeois: What more could you want!

Short bio of Arcadelt

For a long time, the origin of this 16th-century composer (one of the ‘Flemish polyphonists’ (1507-1568)) were unclear. In the early 1980s, the Belgian musicologist Paul Moret, himself a native of Namur, discovered a family known in that region as based in ‘Arc a d’Helt’. ‘Arc’ or ‘Arch’ is the name of a forest, and ‘Helt’ is the name of the hamlet now known as Haltinne. While ploughing through the baptismal registers in the 1990s, he came across a baptism-entry (10 August 1507) of Iacobus Henricus filius Gerardi Fayl arca Eltinsis. ‘Arca Eltinsis’ is the dignified – Latin – form of this toponym, which also became the family name: Arcadelt. So “Jacques Fayl, son of Gerard Fayl d’Arc-a-d’Helt” is our composer’s full name. Indeed ‘Arcadelt’ is easier. The family owned several mines in the surrounding area and ran smithies (e.g. for making weapons: ‘armurie’). A little later we encounter the same Jacques again, this time as a choirboy in Saint Aubain in Namur, with Lambert Masson and Charles de Niquet as chapel master. ¹ Based on the family’s international trade relations, it is quite imaginable, that son Jacques – as an adolescent – one day joins a Florentine envoy coming to buy weapons in Namur. This explains (but it is no explanation, but circular reasoning) why we find Jacques in Florence with the Medici in the late 1520s, early 1530s. He is soon fully acculturated, and establishes his name as a ‘madrigalist’ (publication by the Venetian music printer Gardano of his libri di madrigali (primo libro in 1539, but already a pirate print in 1538) followed by three other books of madrigals… within a year !

By then, Aracadelt had already moved to Rome (pope Paul III – Farnese, 1534-1549). First he is a member (singer) of the ‘Capella Guilia’ at the papal court, later recorded as ‘magister puerorum’ of the papal chapel. There he must have acquainted Michelangelo²

Albert Saey (scholar, editor of Arcadelt’s works in CMM) writes: “The latest studies on Arcadelt’s life make it quite clear that Arcadelt, as a member of a small musical group led by Verdelot and Consilium, both important composers in the early history of the madrigal, spent the years 1527-32 in Lyon, where the troubled conditions of Florence had driven him away. With the restoration of the Medici family, he returned to Florence in 1532 to stay until the murder of Alessandro de’ Medici on 6 January 1537 by his cousin Lorenzino. Arcadelt then seems to have left Florence again, this time for Venice, where he became very active in musical circles. In December 1540, he was found in Rome, where he became a musician in the papal chapel and remained there until 1551, when he disappeared from the Italian scene.” ³

Anyway, why write all this down, when Jérôme Lejeune can also tell it himself albeit in French – in this short video of the Choeur de Namur from 2018 (from 0:50 onwards). At the same time, hear what Arcadelt sounds like:

In the 1550s Arcadelt found himself in Paris, where he was employed as Chapel master by Charles de Guise, Cardinal of Lorraine (who thus ‘held court’ not only in Nancy, but also in Paris). In a publication dedicated to him (Missae tres Iacobo Arcadet, 1557), he also calls himself ‘regius musicus’ (in the Psalms anthology, this becomes: ‘chantre de la chambre du roy’). Now it is not Italian madrigals he writes but French chansons, and church music (Masses, motets, Lamentations, and a Magnificat), published by Du Chemin, or Le Roy & Ballard). He died on 14 October 1568 at the age of 61, a musician of European stature.

Huguenot Psalms?

Arcadelt: in the service of a cardinal, and yet Huguenot psalms ? How is it possible that this composer (his entire career in the service of Roman Catholic Church princes) nevertheless has written six ‘French Psalms’, we immediately associate with Calvin: ‘le psautier huguenot‘ we even call the collection. The answer is quite simple: between 1550 and 1600, just about every self-respecting composer from the francophone world dealt with those French Psalms. And the association with the Calvin liturgy was already there (from the mid-1540s), but it was never exclusive, especially as far as the first 50 Psalm settings were concerned. These had been composed by Clément Marot, court poet to the French king, and served for personal meditation (as a text): The text editions of those Cinquante Pseaumes de David…. are uncountable. They were also included in the collected works (Les Oeuvres) that flooded the market after Marot’s death in 1544. They – like his chansons, epigrams, blasons – challenged composers to make music to them. After all then recitation becomes… singing. And: Qui cantat bis orat. The first polyphonic musical versions appear even before there are melodies (e.g. in Antwerp – Appenzeller 1542, Manchicourt 1544, in the form of a motet). The first settings with reference to the Geneva melody see the light in Paris (Pierre Certon, Antoine Mornable, 1546). The first volume (‘livre’) filled with only polyphonic Psalm settings appears in 1547 in Lyon (Loys Bourgeois). And then Paris could not be left behind: Clément Janequin (yes, indeed, best known for scrawny chansons) sets all Marot’s Psalms to music, using the Geneva melody (1549, first selection, 1559 complete): harmonisations, lightly ornamented, tuneful. And then comes the rest. It really becomes a hype. From very simple harmonisations (note-against-note) to very complex contrapuntal compositions, where the melody serves as cantus firmus, or provides motives. Sometimes such a publication does say something about the composer’s religious sympathies, but very often nothing. In any case, they could not be used for the Reformed liturgy, as there only unaccompanied unison singing applied. And – don’t forget: the French Wars of Religion had yet to be fought (the Bartholomew’s Day fell in 1572). That is, what definition the French kingdom would give to ‘Christian’ was not yet at all a foregone conclusion. Arcadelt’s bread-lord, although fiercely anti-Protestant, was also anti-roman-Catholic: He sought a (Gallican) church independent of Rome. When political antagonisms intensified in the late 1560s (positions hardened: became ‘mutually exclusive’), he sided with the Roman Catholic faction. Nothing yet of this pervasive denominationalism, then, in the 1550s, when his court chapel master published six French Psalms in Paris. The title says it all (and unfortunately we have to make do with it, as only the tune book with the ‘bassus’ has survived.)

Six Psalmes de David, composés en musique au long…. (1559)

Full title:

SIX PSALMES DE DAVID, COM=
posés en Musique au long (en forme de Motetz) à quatre & cinq
parties par M. IAQVES ARCADET,⁴
chantre de la chambre du Roy,
& maistre de la chappelle de Monsieur le Cardinal de Lorraine,

Paris : Adrian Le Roy et Robert Ballard, 1559. – bassus.⁵.

• The content (NB: all psalms are set in their entirety (tout au long), with the scoring and mood often varying by verse (partie). They are Psalm motets.
  • Il faut que de tous mes esprits (Ps. 138)
  • La terre au Seigneur appartient (Ps. 24)
  • Estant assis aux rives aquatiques (Ps. 137)
  • Bien heureux est quiconques (Ps. 128)
  • Du fons de ma pensée (Ps. 130), 
  • Qui est-ce qui conversera (Ps. 15).

These settings have enjoyed a certain popularity, we know from objective sources:

• Five of them (excluding Psalm 128) are also found in a manuscript now preserved in Geneva, but originating from Paris⁶.
• Psalm 128 was already published in 1554 by Guillaume Guéroult in his Premier livre des pseaulmes et sentences… Mis en musique en forme de motetz, par divers excellens musiciens. [Genève] : Simon Du Bosc et Guillaume Guéroult, 1554.
• Psalm 138 was already published in 1555, also by Guillaume Guéroult, in his Second livre des pseaulmes et sentences, tirées tant du Psalmiste royal que des autres sainct prophetes, mis en musique en forme de motetz, par divers excellens musiciens… [Genève] : Simon Du Bosc et Guillaume Guéroult, 1555.

So, of the official Paris edition only the bassus (Berkeley) is extant, printed by Le Roy et Ballard. Clearly a deluxe edition. Of one Psalm, 138, we fortunately also have the earlier version, published in Geneva by Guillaume Guéroult, the godfather of French Protestant music culture. Not a luxury edition at all (tiny voicebooks), but completely preserved. It is in Bologna, in the music library of the Liceo Musicale (all 5 voicebooks), bound together with another music publication by the duo Guéroult – Du Bosc from those years, both in French (religious contrefacts), and Latin motets. Hence, this Psalm can be heard … It is also included in the edition of Arcadelt’s collected works by Albert Saey ⁷. It consists of 4 parts, set for 4, 3, 4 (a voix pareilles), and 5 voices respectively.

Arcadelt in Antwerp – Psalm 138 – 8 september 2024

ARCADELT’s atmospheric setting of Psalm 138 will be heard in the music celebration on 8 September 2024 10h30 – Brabantse Olijfberg – Protestant Church – Antwerp (Lange Winkelstraat 5), directed by Willem Ceuleers.

Dick Wursten, september 2024

1. Paul Moret’s discoveries were published collectively by the Société de Musicologie in Liège in the October 1993 Bulletin. You can read the successive discoveries with footnotes here: https://popups.uliege.be/1371-6735/index.php?id=670&file=1&pid=666. Very convincing, I think
2. Two of Arcadelt’s madrigal texts are poems by M, and A is mentioned three times by M in his correspondence.
3. A. Saey, ‘Arcadelt and Michelangelo’, in: Renaissance News 18/4 (1965), p. 300
4. in Frankrijk laat men vaak de ‘l’ weg
5. 4 vol. 4° obl. LRB n° 53. NB: not in RISM. Location: Berkeley (CA) : Jean Gray Hargrove Music Library : M2092.G68.P8 1558. BPIVF 1559/07
6. BGE : Mus. Ms. 572. Only the tenor part has been preserved
7. Jacques Arcadelt, Opera Omnia Vol.X: Corpus Mensurabilis Musicae (Rome: American Institute of Musicology, 1970)