Music and musicians at the Guild of Our Lady in Bergen op Zoom, c. 1470–1510

Abstract

Marian guilds and confraternities proliferated in fifteenth-century Brabant. They gave expression to the pride, devoutness and community spirit of the urban middle classes. Their chapels were invested with all the riches their members could afford: altarpieces, stained-glass windows, painted statues, silk and velvet cloth, gold and silverware, and other expensive ornaments. But the jewel in the crown for every confraternity was polyphony. Prestigious Marian confraternities such as those at 's-Hertogenbosch, Bergen op Zoom and Antwerp were among the major musical establishments of the Low Countries. They employed some of the best-known composers of their time: Jacob Obrecht, Pierre de la Rue, Johannes Ghiselin, Jacobus Barbireau, Matthaeus Pipelare, Nicasius and Jheronimus de Clibano, Paulus de Roda and Hermannus de Atrio. Other Marian confraternities in Brabant are also known to have cultivated polyphony, though probably on a lesser scale, for instance Brussels and Diest.