Adrian Willaert
Adrian Willaert (c. 1490–1562) was a Flemish composer of the High Renaissance, founder of the Venetian School and long-serving maestro di cappella at St Mark’s, Venice.
Mainly active in Italy, he helped transplant the Franco-Flemish polyphonic style south of the Alps and became one of Europe’s most influential musicians between Josquin and Palestrina. At St Mark’s he cultivated antiphonal writing for divided choirs—heard in the Salmi spezzati of 1550—and left a large body of masses, motets, hymns, chansons, madrigals and ricercares. His motet Christi Virgo dilectissima appears among the canonic repertoire on A Thousand Beautiful and Graceful Inventions (MCD 663).
Compositions by Adrian Willaert appear on
A Thousand Beautiful and Graceful Inventions
Subtitled ‘The glorious age of medieval and renaissance canons’, this programme of late Middle Ages and Early Modern choral music is sung by the University of Queensland Chamber Singers under Graeme Morton. The illustrated booklet has programme notes by Denis Collins and Jason Stoessel, with complete texts.