Renaissance

Renaissance music refers to the repertoire composed in Europe between approximately 1400 and 1600, a period of unprecedented intellectual, artistic and scientific upheaval. It is the era in which vocal polyphony reached its greatest refinement, with masters such as Guillaume Dufay, Josquin des Prés, Palestrina and Orlando di Lasso. Music gradually moved beyond the sanctuary of the Church into royal courts, noble salons and even the street, accompanying a growing secularisation of cultural life.

This period also saw the flourishing of instruments — lute, viol, harpsichord, recorder — and the development of secular forms such as the French chanson, the Italian madrigal and the English consort. Ottaviano Petrucci's invention of music printing in 1501 revolutionised the circulation of scores, allowing works to travel at an unprecedented scale and laying the foundations of classical music as we know it.

Robert White was an English Renaissance composer (c.1538–1574) whose vocal works, notably his Lamentations of Jeremiah, exemplify the spiritual and technical heights reached by English polyphony in this period. His music belongs to the tradition of the great polyphonists of Renaissance music and continues to be performed and recorded by specialist ensembles.

Early music festivals are the custodians of this extraordinary repertoire. The Utrecht Early Music Festival, the Boston Early Music Festival and the Ambronay Early Music Festival welcome performers from around the world each year for concerts of exceptional quality. These Renaissance music gatherings are also spaces of research and experimentation, where musicologists and performers collaborate to restore a heritage of inexhaustible richness.