Oakeley, Sir Herbert (Stanley)

Orto, Marbrianus [Marbriano] de [Dujardin, Marbrianus]

The earliest documents of his career name him as a member of the household of Ferry de Cluny, Cardinal-Bishop of Tournai, with whom he travelled to Rome in May to June 1482. Cardinal Ferry died in Rome in October 1483, and in December Orto was appointed a singer in the papal chapel of Sixtus IV. He continued to serve under Innocent VIII and Alexander VI until at least 1499. He was particularly favoured by Innocent VIII (1484–92), who awarded him many benefices and removed the impediment created by his illegitimacy. Orto obtained the lucrative post of procurator, allowing him to represent individuals from his own diocese of Tournai, as well as those in which he held canonries (Liège and Cambrai), at the papal court. In the papal chapel he worked closely with Josquin des Prez. In 1491–3 he and Josquin both sought certain benefices at churches in the diocese of Cambrai. The outcome is not known, but in 1494 Orto was appointed by Alexander VI to serve on a commission to assist Josquin in acquiring a canonry at Cambrai.

At some time between 1489 and 1496, while still a member of the papal chapel, Orto became dean of the collegiate church of Ste Gertrude in Nivelles. As spiritual head of the chapter of canons and canonesses, he eventually took up residence there and maintained a close connection with the community for the rest of his life. He bestowed many gifts on the church, the most lavish being a splendid bronze coffer designed to hold the saint’s reliquary (it is still displayed in the transept).

On 24 May 1505 Orto was appointed singer in the Habsburg-Burgundian chapel of Philip the Fair, who legitimized him. In late 1505 or 1506 Orto became premier chapelain and in this capacity he accompanied the court on Philip’s ill-fated voyage to Spain in 1506. The 17th-century historians Ryckel and Chifflet credited Orto with translating the medieval Latin Vita Gertrudis into French to fulfil a vow he made during the journey, but this translation does not survive.

After Philip's unexpected death in September 1506, Orto and other members of his chapel were retained in Spain by Juana, Philip's widow, until the dissolution of her court in August 1508. Returning to the Netherlands, Orto helped to reorganize the chapel for Philip's son Charles (later Charles V) under the regency of Philip’s sister, Margaret of Austria. A document of 1509 refers to him as ‘first chaplain of my gracious lord’ (i.e. Charles). From 1510 to 1517 he shared that office, on an alternating six-month basis, with Anthoine de Berghes.

In 1510 Orto was recorded as a canon at the church of Our Lady, Antwerp, and in 1513 as a canon at Ste Gudule, Brussels. Although his name is crossed out on the list of payments of Charles’s court on 21 June 1517, in a document dated 18 May 1518 he is called ‘councillor and first chaplain of Charles's chapel’ and in 1522 he was engaged for Charles's voyage to England and Spain. He died at Nivelles in 1529, possibly during the epidemic that ravaged the town in that year.

Until 1940, when Ste Gertrude suffered severe bomb damage, Orto’s tomb inscription could be seen in the pavement of the choir: ‘Here lies Marbrianus Orto, dean and canon of this church, who decorated it with the present bronze coffer and other gifts, February 1528’ [new style 1529].

Among his works the masses are the most important. All five published by Petrucci in Misse de Orto (Venice, 1505) are of the cantus-firmus type, but the treatment of the borrowed melodies is varied. Liturgical chants of the Ordinary are paraphrased in the tenor of the Missa dominicalis. Missa ‘L’homme armé’ presents the well-known tune schematically in various mensurations, diminution and transposition, generally in the tenor but sometimes in one or more of the other voices. Missa ‘La belle se sied’ treats the popular melody more freely, whereas Missa ‘Petita camusetta’(also called ‘Mi mi’) borrows only the first five notes of the tune, using them as head-motif and ostinato. Missa ‘J’ay pris amours’, with two different Credo settings, is built on both the tenor and superius of the anonymous chanson in a technique approaching that of the parody mass.

Like his masses, Orto’s motets are generally based on cantus firmi. The five-part Salve regis mater celebrates the election of Pope Alexander VI in 1492. Although anonymous in I-Rvat C.S.35, it is placed among Orto’s works in that manuscript and is almost certainly by him. His two hymn settings are included in Rvat C.S.15 together with hymns by Dufay and Josquin, and along with anonymous hymn settings in late 15th-century style. Gerber and Osthoff have suggested that Dufay’s hymn cycle (composed around 1430) was revised jointly by Josquin and Orto when both were members of the papal chapel.

Some of his chansons exhibit retrospective traits. D’ung aultre amer and Fors seulement are built on voices from rondeaux by Ockeghem, and the three-part rondeau Venus tu m'a pris is an accompanied duo in the Burgundian manner. Other chansons are more forward-looking: Je ne suis poinct, Mon mary m'a diffamée and Se je perdu mon amy treat popular tunes in lively imitation. Et il y a trois dames a Paris is similar; its homogeneous four-part texture, fluent imitation and attractive themes suggest the ‘modern’ French chanson style of the early 16th century. Standing apart among Orto’s works is Dulces exuviae, a setting of Dido’s lament from the Aeneid. Its chromatic inflections and expressive dissonance, evoking the tragic queen's grief and despair, make this one of the outstanding examples of musical humanism in the Renaissance.

WORKS

masses and mass sections

Misse de Orto (Venice, 1505) [1505]

Missa dominicalis, 4vv, 1505, I-VEcap 761 (c.f. Mass XI, XV, Credo IV)

Missa ‘J’ay pris amours’ (cum duobus Patrem), 4vv, 1505; Ag II ed. in MSD, vi (1965) (c.f. Superius, T of anon. chanson; has 2 Credo)

Missa ‘La belle se sied’, 4vv, 1505, A-Wn 1783 (c.f. popular melody)

Missa ‘L’homme armé’, 4vv, 1505, I-Rvat C.S.64; ed. in Monumenta polyphoniae liturgica, 1st ser., i/7 (Rome, 1948)

Missa ‘Petita camusetta’ (Mi mi), 4vv, 1505, A-Wn 1783, D-J 32; Ag III ed. in AmbrosGM, v, 198 (c.f. motto)

Missa, 4vv, I-Rvat C.S.35 (Superius in canon)

Kyrie in honorem beatissime virginis, 4vv, 15051 (c.f. Kyrie IX); ed. in CMM, xcv (1982)

Credo ‘Le serviteur’, 4vv, A-Wn 1783 (c.f. T of Du Fay’s chanson)

Credo, 5vv, I-Rvat C.S.35 (c.f. Credo IV)

motets

Ave Maria gratia plena, 4vv; ed. in H. Hewitt, O. Petrucci: Harmonice musices odhecaton A (Cambridge, MA, 1942, 2/1946) (c.f. ?chant)

Ave Maria mater gracie, 5vv, B-Br 9126, I-Rvat C.S.35

Da pacem Domine, 5vv, Rvat C.S.35 (c.f. chant)

Descendi in ortum meum, 4vv, A-Wn 15941 (Superius lost; c.f. chant)

Domine non secundum, 4vv; ed. as part of ‘Missa carminum’ in J. Wolf, Werken van Jacob Obrecht (Amsterdam and Leipzig, 1908–21), xx–xxi; repr. (Farnborough, Hants., 1968), iv, 101–11 (c.f. chant)

Salve regis mater/Hic est sacerdos, 5vv, I-Rvat C.S.35 (for the election of Pope Alexander VI, 1492; c.f. chant; anon. in source but surrounded by works by Orto and probably by him)

other liturgical works

Lamentatio Jeremie prophete, 4vv, ed. in Musikalische Denkmäler, vi (Mainz, 1965)

Lucis creator optime, 4vv, I-Rvat C.S.15 (c.f. chant; verse 2: Superius and B in canon; verse 4: Superius, T in canon)

Ut queant laxis, 4vv, Rvat C.S.15 (c.f. chant in S, B; verse 2, Nuncius celso, is by Du Fay)

chansons

D’ung aultre amer, 4vv, ed. in MRM, ii (1967) (c.f. Superius of Ockeghem’s rondeau; A, B are riddle canons)

Et il y a trois dames a Paris (Les troys filles de Paris), 4vv, 15043, I-Fc B.2442 ed. M. Honegger and G. Dottin (Paris, 1967)

Fors seulement, 4vv, Fc B.2439; ed. in RRMMA, xiv (1982) (c.f. Superius of Ockeghem’s rondeau)

Je ne suis poinct, 4vv, Fc B.2442 (B lost but probably in canon with T; c.f. popular melody)

Les troys filles de Paris, see Et il y a trois dames a Paris

Mon mary m’a diffamée, 4vv, ed. in MRM, ii (1967) (c.f. popular melody in canon)

Se je perdu mon amy, 4vv, CH-SGs 461; ed. in F.J. Giesbert, Ein altes Spielbuch aus der Zeit um 1500 (Mainz, 1936) (c.f. popular melody)

Venus tu m’a pris (rondeau), 3vv, ed. in H. Hewitt, O. Petrucci: Harmonice musices odhecaton A (Cambridge, MA, 1942, 2/1946)

other works

Dulces exuviae, 4vv, ed. in Picker (1965) (text: Virgil, Aeneid iv.651–4)

‘La mi la sol’, 4vv, CH-SGs 461; ed. in F.J. Giesbert, Ein altes Spielbuch aus der Zeit um 1500 (Mainz, 1936) (textless)

doubtful works

Impulsus eversus sum, attrib. ‘Joannes de Horto’ in 15645, probably by a later composer

Je cuide se ce temps me dure, frag., attrib. ‘De orte’ in D-ISL 1544, elsewhere attrib. Japart and Congiet

BIBLIOGRAPHY

MARTIN PICKER