A South German Humanist Correspondence

On June 8, 1506, Lorenz Beheim, a humanist scholar and cleric who, after a long period in papal service, from 1505 held a canonry at St. Stephen’s in Bamberg, sent a series of musical pieces to the well-known humanist and Nuremberg patrician Willibald Pirckheimer. Pirckheimer had spent many years in Italy for study purposes. He became a member of the city council of his hometown in 1496, and since 1500 belonged to the circle of advisors and confidants of Maximilian I.[33]

Abb. Willibald Pirckheimer

Albrecht Dürer, Portrait des Willibald Pirckheimer, Kupferstichkabinett, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Nr. 422-2 (http://www.smb-digital.de/eMuseumPlus?service=ExternalInterface&module=c…).

The correspondence between the two friends provides insight into the intense exchange of repertoire that took place around 1500 between European regions, between court and city, and also between professional and amateur musicians like Pirckheimer and Beheim.

Lorenz Beheim’s Letter to Willibald Pirckheimer. 1506. Junii 8. Babenbergae

Salve. Hodie lectis litteris tuis statim perquisivi libellos meos musicae et reperi, et ecce tibi mitto in uno quinternione II bassadanzas de Johann Maria et I zelor [sic] amoris Boruni. La prima bassa è una cosa troppo forte, perchè e doppia, et la 2a è simpia. In alio autem quinternione, cuius prima suprascriptio est “Alla bataglia“, è una bona cosa. Reperies caecus et ellas. Deinde la bassadanza de Augustino Trombone, qui est in curia regis Romani, et est satis bona e ligiera. Deinde est alia simplex bassa, quae potest pulsari in organis. Ex his omnibus colligas tibi unam, quae placeat. Et remitte mihi hos quinterniones omnino et expedias. Ego autem pulsavi aliam bassam et tibi etiam eam misissem, nisi tempus fuisset mihi nimis breve ad copiandum; mittam tamen.[34]

(Bamberg, June 8, 1506

Greetings. After reading your letter today, I immediately searched for and found my music books. I am sending you here in a booklet of five leaves two bassedanze by Johann Maria and a “zelor amoris” [Je loe amours] by Boruni. The first bassadanza is quite difficult because it is double, the second is simple.[35] In a second booklet of five leaves [there is] a first piece titled “Alla bataglia”, which is beautiful. You will also find “caecus” [non iudicat de coloribus] and “ellas” [Hélas …] in it; then a bassadanza by Augustin the Trombonist, who is at the court of the Roman king, and it is quite good and light; then another simple bassadanza that can be played on the organ. Choose one piece that you like from all of these. And return these booklets to me completely and quickly. I also played another bassadanza and would have sent it to you as well if I had not had too little time to copy it; I will send it later.)

Three weeks later, Beheim fulfilled his promise and sent additional bassedanze. The note that these were “ad XIII cordas” (for thirteen strings) but easily adaptable “ad XI cordas” (for eleven strings),[36] indicates that Beheim’s shipments consisted of lute pieces or arrangements of pieces for lutes with seven or six courses.

Only Beheim’s letters have survived, not the accompanying music booklets. However, most of the mentioned works are known thanks to a rich transmission in music manuscripts and prints: “Zelor amoris” is undoubtedly the famous and widely arranged chanson Je loe amours by Gilles Binchois,[37] “caecus” the frequently transmitted “instrumental fantasia” Cecus non iudicat de coloribus by Alexander Agricola, “A la battaglia” probably the eponymous song setting by Heinrich Isaac composed in Florence (» Hörbsp.♫ A la battaglia), and “Ellas” one of the numerous Franco-Flemish chansons beginning with “Hélas”, most probably the widely preserved and often arranged Hélas, que pourra by Firminus Caron.

The bassedanze sent by Beheim are unknown. If they are not lost, they might be among the many dances anonymously included in sixteenth-century lute music collections, although a precise identification is impossible. However, the “authors” of the bassedanze can be identified: “Augustino Trombone” is Schubinger, and “Johann Maria” is a lutenist also known as “Johannes Maria Dominici” and “Giovanni Maria Hebreo”, who was active in Florence, Rome and Urbino between 1492 and 1526[38]; he was also in contact with Ulrich and Augustin Schubinger.[39]

Grantley McDonald has considered the possibility that Beheim obtained the pieces by Agricola, Schubinger, and Isaac from Eberhardt Senft, a member of Maximilian’s chapel and like Beheim a cleric in Bamberg (at St. Jakob).[40] It is notable that Beheim refers to Schubinger as “Augustino Trombone”, using his Italian name; he also switches from Latin to Italian elsewhere. All the pieces were either widespread in Italy (this applies to the French chansons as well as to Cecus) and/or composed by musicians active there or originating there. It is thus equally conceivable that Beheim, who had returned to his German homeland from Rome only a few years earlier in 1503, brought the collection back from Italy himself. Regardless of that, Beheim’s booklets, with their mix of chansons, an instrumental fantasia and dances, can be seen as typical of the repertoire used by a professional lutenist like Schubinger around 1500.

Besause of Beheim’s mention of the “bassadanza de Augustino Trombone”, Schubinger is sometimes referred to as a “composer” in the literature. However, it would be a gross simplification to imagine the “composer” Schubinger according to a common modern notion as someone who conceived and notated a piece of music at a desk before it was performed in a second step. Given an instrumental music culture characterised by various transitions and overlaps between orality and literacy, between the use of pre-existing material and the flexible handling of given material, other scenarios are conceivable and even more likely. The starting point could have been a piece originally improvised by Schubinger, which was later notated, not necessarily by him. It is also possible that Schubinger relied on a template (created by whoever and in whatever form) but that his version became widespread and eventually circulated under his name.