Orlando Gibbons
Orlando Gibbons (bapt. 25 December 1583 – 5 June 1625) was an English composer and keyboard player who was one of the last masters of the English Virginalist School and English Madrigal School. The best known member of a musical family dynasty, by the 1610s he was the leading composer and organist in England, with a career cut short by his sudden death in 1625. As a result, Gibbons's oeuvre was not as large as that of his contemporaries, like the elder William Byrd,[2] but he made considerable contributions to many genres of his time. He is often seen as a transitional figure from the Renaissance to the Baroque periods.
Gibbons was born into a musical family where his father was a wait, his brothers—Edward, Ellis and Ferdinand—were musicians and Orlando was expected to follow the tradition. It is not known under whom he studied, although it may have been with Edward or Byrd, but he almost certainly studied the keyboard in his youth. Irrespective of his education, he was musically proficient enough to be appointed an unsalaried member of the Chapel Royal in May 1603 and a full-fledged gentleman of the Chapel Royal as junior organist by 1605. By 1606 he had graduated from King's College, Cambridge with a Bachelor of Music degree.
Throughout his professional career, Gibbons had increasingly good relations with many important people of the English court.
Gibbons developed Byrd's foundations of the English
Life and career
Birthplace and background
Orlando Gibbons was born in
The Gibbons family can be traced back to Richard Gibbons (d. 1577),[n 3] who was a glover active in Oxford; by 1549/50 he became a hanaster.[14] Richard's son William was probably born in 1540 and at some point married Mary, whose maiden name is unknown.[15] By 1567, William became wait at Cambridge by 1567.[16] From 1580 to 1588 he lived in Oxford, where he was a city councillor and head of the town waits there.[5][17]
Early life
While in Oxford, William and Mary had Orlando as probably the seventh of nine surviving children.[n 4] There is no surviving record of the date of his birth, but he is recorded as being baptised at St. Martin's on Christmas Day 1583.[11] It would be consistent with the normal practice of the time that Gibbons was born no more than a week before his baptism.[18] Gibbons's father had previously lived in Cambridge where he was also the head of the town waits and around 1588, when Orlando was 4–5 years old, the Gibbons family moved back to Cambridge and William resumed his previous post there.[19][4]
Orlando was born into a musical family: not only was his father a musician, but his oldest brother,
Gibbons's composition teacher is also unknown.[4] It is possible he continued study with Edward, though there is no record of this.[18] Another possible composition teacher is William Byrd, who was at least 40 years his senior and the most respected English composer at the time.[4] Gibbons and Byrd along with the composer John Bull later collectively published music and since Bull was a student of Byrd's, Gibbons may very well also have been.[4] Regardless of how his musical education came about, Gibbons was known to be composing music by the end of his time at the choir in 1599, at age 15–16.[18] There is nothing known of Gibbons from then until 1603.[26]
Early career and marriage
Gibbons's abilities had reached the point to allow him become a musician of the
In 1606 Gibbons married Elizabeth Patten on 17 February.[25][36] Her father, John Patten, was a yeoman of the vestry in the Chapel Royal, and probably well acquainted with Gibbons, which would have helped to bring about the marriage.[37] When John Patten died in 1623, he made Gibbons his sole heir, residuary legatee and left 200 pounds for his children.[38] Later in 1606, Orlando graduated from Cambridge with the degree of Bachelor in Music.[38][39] Gibbons and his wife lived in Woolstaple (now Bridge Street) which was in the parish of St Margaret's, Westminster, the church where Gibbons's seven children—James, Alice, Christopher, Ann, Mary, Elizabeth and Orlando—would be baptised.[40][32]
Publishing and patronage
By the 1610s Gibbons had become a composer of high repute and the most outstanding organist in England.
In 1613 Gibbons had six works published in the first printed collection of English keyboard music, Parthenia, which included works by the older composers, Byrd and Bull.[50] This publication was to celebrate the marriage of the Princess Elizabeth Stuart to Frederick V of the Palatinate.[51] Gibbons's compositions written around the time of Parthenia include various anthems dedicated to senior nobles and clergy: the pavane Lord Salisbury for Lord Salisbury, the wedding anthem Blessed are all they for the Earl of Somerset, as well as anthems for Godfrey Goodman, William Laud and Anthony Maxey. Such works suggest that he was well associated throughout the court and that he was aiming for a permanent post.[50] Frederick returned to Heidelberg with Elizabeth in 1613 and the couple was accompanied by a vast entourage, including Coperario and the harpist Daniel Callinder.[52] A list of attendants includes "Gibbons", which presumably refers to Orlando Gibbons, meaning that the composer spent some time in the capital of the Electoral Palatinate.[53] Gibbons seems to have taken Bull's place, who was in financial jeopardy.[53]
In 1614 William Leighton published The Teares and Lamentatacions of a Sorrowfull Soule with 2 contributions by Gibbons, O Lord how do my woes increase and O Lord, I lift my heart to Thee.[54] Although he possibly started as early as 1605, Gibbons was the joint organist of the Royal Chapel with Edmund Hooper by at least 1615.[52] The same year he received two grants from King James I, worth 150 pounds total.[52][55] These grants were: "For and in consideration of the good and faithful service heretofore done unto ourself by Orlando Gibbons our organist, and divers other good causes and considerations us thereunto moving".[55] Gibbons continued writing for James I, composing the anthem Great King of Gods and the court song Do not repine, fair sun in celebration of the King's 1617 visit to Scotland.[52]
Late career
By the late 1610s Gibbons was undoubtedly the most important musician and composer at court as Byrd had been long-retired in
While once assumed to be fact, there is now much doubt whether Gibbons received a Doctorate of Music in May 1622. In 1692, Wood stated:
"On the 17th of May, Orlando Gibbons, one of the organists of his majesty's chapel, did supplicate the venerable congregation that he might accumulate the degrees in music; but whether he was admitted to the one, or license to proceed in the other, it appears not."
— Wood (1692, p. 406)
This uncertainty has continued until the present day. Gibbons’s 8-part full anthem, O clap your hands was sung on 17 May 1622 at the degree ceremony for William Heather.[61][62] Heather had financially supported William Camden's creation and maintenance of the Camden Professor of Ancient History chair, and in return the university awarded him the honorary degrees of bachelor in music and doctor of music, even though he was not known to be a musician.[46][63] The author Sir John Hawkins and musicologists Fellowes and David Mateer state unequivocally that Gibbons was awarded a doctorate along with Heather, and cite O clap your hands as the composer’s qualifying exercise for the degree.[64][62][46] Other musicologists—Peter Le Huray, John Harper and John Harley—express some doubt whether Gibbons received a doctorate.[52][65] Specifically, Harley cites a record in the Cheque book of the Chapel Royal that refers to William Heather as "doctor" but Gibbons as "senior organist."[66] The same writer refers to a letter from Camden to William Piers from 18 May 1622 that says Gibbons is a Doctor of Music.[63] Harley suggests that the authenticity of the letter is uncertain, since the original does not survive; he suggests that Camden could have written something such as "G––––s," which an editor assumed to mean Gibbons.[66] The most convincing piece of evidence is thought to be the absence of mention of the supposed doctorate of music on Gibbons's Cambridge monument, erected in his memory when he died.[63] Although the existing evidence seems to support the conclusion that he never achieved a doctorate in music, there is no indisputable evidence to confirm it.[66]
Final years and death
Some time in 1623, George Wither published Hymnes and Songs of the Church in which Gibbons provided the tunes for most of the songs.[67][68] The same year he succeeded John Parsons as the organist at Westminster Abbey, with Thomas Day as junior organist.[69] This was probably the most important position Gibbons had taken in his career thus far and on 7 May 1625 he officiated at the funeral of King James I.[70]
During late May 1625, the English court was preparing to receive
Character
There is little known about Gibbons's personality or character.[26] Harley names this, along with the period between his time in the Choir of King's and his appointment at the Chapel Royal (1599–1603), as the largest gaps in the modern understanding of Gibbons.[26] The lives of his contemporaries Byrd and Bull make Gibbons's life seem comparably dull.[26] Byrd frequently found himself in court—once even against Gibbons's father William[76]—in disputes over property or accusations that he was Catholic in post-Reformation England.[26] Bull on the other hand had to flee the country while chief organist of the Chapel Royal on charges of adultery.[77] One incident in Gibbons's life, however, is described by Harley as "the most bizarre event of Gibbons's career".[78] A complaint in 1620 reported that Henry Eveseed, a yeoman of the vestry, assaulted Gibbons, the report saying: he "did violently and sodenly without cause runne uppon Mr Gibbons took up and threw him doune uppon a standard... and withall he tare his band from his neck".[79][42][n 7][n 8] Other than this, the relative normality of Gibbons's life suggests he maintained good relations with his employers and fellow musicians.[26] His patron Hatton seems to have become a close friend.[26] In fact, Hatton and his wife, Alice Fanshawe, were probably the namesakes of two of Gibbons's two eponymous children.[44][34] Other close acquaintances throughout his life included Wray, his father-in-law John Patten and his older brother Edward.[81] It is also possible Gibbons had a particularly close relationship with Prince Charles; Gibbons's death's "formal observation, investigation, and reporting, perhaps suggests how close he may have been to the new king."[82]
Gibbons's music may give some insight into his character.[83] His career was primarily centered around court,[50] where he seems to have been increasingly successful.[81] Indeed Gibbons's Chapel Royals post at age 19, and then 21, would have been an impressive feat, comparable to Byrd becoming the organist and choirmaster of the Lincoln Cathedral in his early twenties.[25][84] Each of the four positions he held centered around his ability as a keyboardist.[3] Contemporary accounts hold him in high regard in this respect; during a 1624 visit from the French ambassador, John Hacket said upon entering Westminster Abbey that "At the entrance, the organ was touched by the best finger of that age, Mr. Orlando Gibbons."[52] John Chamberlain stated in a letter to Sir Dudley Carleton on Gibbons's death that he had "the best hand in England".[85]
Music
His oeuvre as a whole suggests he was comfortable composing in the genres he had established himself in, rarely adventuring to unexplored genres.[83]
Gibbons wrote a large number of keyboard works, around thirty
Gibbons's surviving keyboard output comprises some 45 pieces. The polyphonic fantasia and dance forms are the best represented genres. Gibbons's writing exhibits a command of three- and four-part counterpoint. Most of the fantasias are complex, multi-sectional pieces, treating multiple subjects imitatively. Gibbons's approach to melody, in both his fantasias and his dances, features extensive development of simple musical ideas, as for example in Pavane in D minor and Lord Salisbury's Pavan and Galliard.[86]
Legacy
In the 20th century, the Canadian pianist Glenn Gould championed Gibbons's music, and named him as his favourite composer.[87] Gould wrote of Gibbons's hymns and anthems: "ever since my teen-age years this music ... has moved me more deeply than any other sound experience I can think of."[88]
In one interview, Gould compared Gibbons to Beethoven and Webern:
...despite the requisite quota of scales and shakes in such half-hearted virtuoso vehicles as the Salisbury Galliard, one is never quite able to counter the impression of music of supreme beauty that lacks its ideal means of reproduction. Like Beethoven in his last quartets, or Webern at almost any time, Gibbons is an artist of such intractable commitment that, in the keyboard field, at least, his works work better in one's memory, or on paper, than they ever can through the intercession of a sounding-board.
— Payzant (1986, pp. 82–83)
Gibbons's death, on 5 June 1625, is regularly marked in
Musicologist and composer,
References
Notes
- ^ This portrait is kept at Faculty of music and The Bate Collection of Musical Instruments at the University of Oxford and is only known to be a "copy from a lost original once in the possession of a Mrs. Fussell."[1]
- ^ See early accounts in Hawkins (1853, p. 573), Fétis (1866, p. 1), Maitland (1889) and Bridge (1920, p. 34) for instance, where Gibbons is said to be born in Cambridge without noting any doubt.
- ^ Thewlis (1940) first brought Richard's existence to the attention of scholars.[13] Harley (1999, p. 3) noted that Richard is assumed to be a descendent of the Gibbons family, as no surviving Oxford records list any other freeman of the time whose surname was Gibbons. Harley (1999, p. 3) nevertheless characterises the connection as "fairly certain".
- ^ The birthdates of two of his sisters, Thomasine and Elizabeth, are uncertain leading to the possibility of Gibbons being the eighth or youngest surviving sibling. Their first child, Richard, died as an infant.[8]
- ^ The verse anthem How hath ye City sate solitary by their brother Edward may have been a tribute a to the victims of the plague.[31]
- ^ Fellowes (1951, p. 38) reports this complaint as being filed in 1602, not 1620 like Harley (1999, pp. 57–58). Fellowes's account is almost certainly a typo. Immediately before Fellows's account he discusses events of 1619, and immediately after events of 1621.[80] Additionally, Eveseed became a yeoman in 1611,[78] after Fellow's supposed date of 1602.
- ^ Harper (2008, "Death and posthumous reputation") speculates that the attack by Eveseed perhaps influenced Gibbons later death from a brain haemorrhage.
Citations
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 287.
- ^ a b Fellowes 1951, p. 55.
- ^ a b Harper 2008, "2. Works".
- ^ a b c d e f g Turbet 2016, "Introduction".
- ^ a b Harper 2008, "Introduction".
- ^ Fellowes 1951, pp. 32–33.
- ^ a b c Fellowes 1951, p. 32.
- ^ a b Harley 1999, p. 7.
- ^ Harley 1999, pp. 5–9.
- ^ Wood 1692, p. 406.
- ^ a b c Fellowes 1951, p. 33.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 9.
- ^ Howard 1951, p. 160.
- ^ Harley 1999, pp. 3–4.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 5.
- ^ Harley 1999, pp. 5, 7.
- ^ Fellowes 1951, p. 17.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i Harley 1999, p. 24.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 11.
- ^ Fellowes 1951, p. 28.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 18.
- ^ Fellowes 1951, p. 29–31.
- ^ Harley 1999, pp. 16–17.
- ^ Fellowes 1951, p. 34–35.
- ^ a b c d Fellowes 1951, p. 35.
- ^ a b c d e f g Harley 1999, p. 75.
- ^ a b c Harley 1999, p. 29.
- ^ Harley 1999, pp. 27–28.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 28.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 16.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 21.
- ^ a b c d Huray 2001.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 30.
- ^ a b c Harper 2008.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 31.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 32.
- ^ Harley 1999, pp. 32–33.
- ^ a b Fellowes 1951, p. 36.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 33.
- ^ Harley 1999, pp. 35–36.
- ^ Fellowes 1951, p. 37.
- ^ a b c Fellowes 1951, p. 38.
- ^ Harper 2008, "Early career and marriage".
- ^ a b Harley 1999, p. 37.
- ^ Bridge 1920, p. 35.
- ^ a b c Fellowes 1951, p. 39.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 39.
- ^ Harley 1999, pp. 39–40.
- ^ a b Harley 1999, p. 40.
- ^ a b c Harper 2008, "Career in court music".
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 43.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j Huray 2001, "1. Life".
- ^ a b Dart 1970, p. 31.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 51.
- ^ a b Fellowes 1951, pp. 37–38.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 58.
- ^ Harley 1999, pp. 58–59.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 59.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 62–63.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 63.
- ^ Bridge 1920, p. 42.
- ^ a b Mateer 2008.
- ^ a b c Harley 1999, p. 65.
- ^ Hawkins 1853, p. 573.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 64–66.
- ^ a b c Harley 1999, p. 66.
- ^ Bridge 1920, p. 43.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 67.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 68.
- ^ Fellowes 1951, p. 40.
- ^ Fellowes 1951, p. 41.
- ^ a b Fellowes 1951, p. 44.
- ^ Fellowes 1951, p. 45.
- ^ Fellowes 1951, p. 50.
- ^ "Orlando and Christopher Gibbons". Westminster Abbey. Retrieved 28 September 2022.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 12.
- ^ Neighbour & Jeans 2001, "3. In the southern Netherlands, 1613–28".
- ^ a b Harley 1999, p. 57.
- ^ Harley 1999, pp. 57–58.
- ^ Fellowes 1951, pp. 38–39.
- ^ a b Harley 1999, pp. 75–76.
- ^ Harper 2008, "Death and posthumous reputation".
- ^ a b Harley 1999, p. 76.
- ^ Harley 1999, p. 31, 75.
- ^ Vining 1977, p. 415.
- ^ Apel 1997, pp. 320–323.
- ^ Gould & Cott 2005, p. 65.
- ^ Gould 1990, p. 438.
- ^ "The Choir of King's College, Cambridge » History of the Choi". www.kings.cam.ac.uk. Retrieved 28 February 2020.
- ^ Morris 1978.
- ^ Grove 1900, pp. 71
- ^ Rockwell 1984.
Sources
Early
- ISBN 978-1-112-52076-1.
- IMSLP.
- ISBN 978-0-486-21049-0.
- doi:10.1093/odnb/9780192683120.013.10598. (subscription or UK public library membershiprequired)
- OCLC 79528970.
- OCLC 847943279.
Modern
- Books
- Apel, Willi (1997). The History of Keyboard Music to 1700. Indiana University Press. ISBN 978-0-253-21141-5.
- ISBN 978-0-208-00848-0.
- ISBN 978-0-679-73135-1.
- ISBN 978-0-226-11623-5.
- Harley, John (1999). Orlando Gibbons and the Gibbons Family of Musicians. London: ISBN 978-1-840-14209-9.
- Morris, Christopher (1978). The Oxford Book of Tudor Anthems: 34 Anthems for Mixed Voices. Oxford University Press, Music Department. ISBN 978-0-19-353325-7.
- Payzant, Geoffrey (1986). Glenn Gould: Music & Mind. Formac. ISBN 978-0-88780-145-7.
- Journal and encyclopedia articles
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica (2020). "Orlando Gibbons". Encyclopædia Britannica. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
- Anderton, H. Orsmond (1 June 1912). "Orlando Gibbons". The Musical Times. 53 (832): 367–369. JSTOR 907324.
- JSTOR 952296.
- Duffin, Ross W. (March 1993). "Princely Pastimes, or a Courtly Catch, being the History of Another Musical Fragment at Case Western Reserve University". JSTOR 898924.
- Harper, John (December 1983). "Orlando Gibbons: The Domestic Context of His Music and Christ Church MS 21". The Musical Times. 124 (1690): 767–770. JSTOR 962243.
- Harper, John (2008). "Gibbons, Orlando (bap. 1583, d. 1625), composer and keyboard player". ISBN 978-0-19-861412-8. (subscription or UK public library membershiprequired)
- JSTOR 935033.
- Huray, Peter Le (2001). "Gibbons, Orlando". ISBN 978-1-56159-263-0. (subscription or UK public library membershiprequired)
- Josephson, Nors S. (1998–2002). "Interrelationships between the London Street Cry Settings". JSTOR 20532424.
- Mateer, David (2008). "Heather, William (c. 1563–1627), musician and benefactor". ISBN 978-0-19-861412-8. (subscription or UK public library membershiprequired)
- ISBN 978-1-56159-263-0. (subscription or UK public library membershiprequired)
- Thewlis, George A. (January 1940). "Oxford and the Gibbons Family". Music & Letters. 21 (1): 31–33. JSTOR 727619.
- Turbet, Richard (January–March 2000). "Orlando Gibbons: Music in Printed Editions 1625—1925". Fontes Artis Musicae. 47 (1). JSTOR 23509038.
- Turbet, Richard (2016). "Orlando Gibbons". . (subscription required)
- Vining, Paul (October 1977). "Orlando Gibbons: The Portraits". JSTOR 733988.
- Online
- New York Times. Retrieved 23 April 2020.
Further reading
See Turbet (2016) for an extensive bibliography
- Vining, Paul (November 1983). "Gibbons and His Patrons". JSTOR 961451.
External links
- Free scores
- Free scores by Orlando Gibbons at the International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP)
- Free scores by Orlando Gibbons in the Choral Public Domain Library (ChoralWiki)
- Free scores by Orlando Gibbons at the Mutopia Project
- List of compositions by Gibbons, Orlando at the Digital Image Archive of Medieval Music
- Miscellaneous
- Works by Orlando Gibbons at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)