Pipelare, Matthaeus (EN)

Pipelare, Pipalare, Pipelaer, Pipelaire, Pipilari, Pypeler, Matthaeus, Matheeusz, Matheeussen, *c.1450, †c. 1515, Franco-Flemish composer. The only known information links Pipelare to the Marian confraternity active at St John’s Cathedral in ‘s-Hertogenbosch (Bois-le-Duc), where he was choirmaster from 1498 to 1500. A candidate for this position was sought in Antwerp, so it is possible that Pipelare had previously worked in that city. The composer may also have had some connection with St John’s Church in Ghent, for which he wrote the mass Floruit egregius. The surname Pipelare (“piper”), popular in the Netherlands, is unlikely to denote any position held by him. 

Pipelare’s extremely diverse work was highly regarded by, among others, A. Ornithoparchus (Musicae actívete micrologus, 1517) and C. Sebastiani (Bellum musicale, 1563), who ranked him, along with Josquin des Prés, P. de La Rue and A. Brumel, among the most outstanding “musici pratici”. He shared with his great contemporaries a penchant for complex polyphonic texture, evident, for example, in his use of canons, syncopation and differentiated mensural notation in simultaneously sounding voices (as in the mass Dicit Dominus). However, some of his masses, the magnificat and especially his chansons are written in a simpler style and contain numerous homorhythmic sections. Most of his sacred works, as well as some secular ones (Een vrolic wesen, Ic weedt een molenarinne, the first version of Fors seulement which quotes the superius from J. Ockeghem’s chanson), are based on fixed melodies. His cantus firmus, incorporating one or more different pieces (e.g. the sequence and antiphon in the Johannes Chrisie / Ecce puer mass, a dozen or so chants from the office of St. Livinius in the Floruit…mass), may appear in different voices and is subject to paraphrase. Pipelare also borrowed melodic material from his own works (the mass Fors seulement with a tenor from one of the versions of the chanson), and some of his compositions are even self-contrafacta: the four-part motet Laudate pueri and the tricinium Sensus canis share material with parts of the missa sine nomine and Mi mi, while the motet Exortum est is based on one of the versions of the chanson Fors seulement.  He also introduced diverse symbolic elements into his works, which undoubtedly contributed to the high esteem in which he was held by his contemporaries.  He composed the motet Memorare Mater Christi, set to a text describing the seven sorrows of the Virgin Mary, for seven voices, which in the only surviving source are named: Primus dolor, Secundus dolor, etc.; these unusual designations clearly indicate the symbolic significance of the seldom used number of voices. Furthermore, as a cantus firmus in this motet, Pipelare employed the melody of the villancico (by J. Urrede) Nunca fué pena mayor, which, through its association with the original text (concerning suffering and pain), acquires additional symbolic meaning.

Literature: R. Cross The Life and Works of M. Pipelare, “Musica Disciplina” XVII, 1963; W. Eiders Studien zur Symbolik in der Musik der alten Niederländer, Bilthoven 1968; R. Cross The Chansons of M. Pipelare, “The Musical Quarterly” LV 1969; C. Santarelli Messe fiamminghe sulla chanson “Fors seulement”, “Rivista internazionale di musica sacra” IV, 1981; M.J. Bloxam In Praise of Spurious Saint. The “Missae Floruit egregius” by Pipelare and La Rue, “Journal of the American Musicological Society” XLIV, 1991; R.C. Wegman Communication, “Journal of the American Musicological Society” XLV, 1992; V. Borghetti Pierre Alamire and Matthaeus Pipelare’s Missa ‘Fors seulement’, “Yearbook of the Alamire Foundation” V, 2003; S. Lempert Studien zu den Chansons und Motetten von Matheus Pipelare, Frankfurt am Main 2004.