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In the company of choral director Jeremy Summerly, Donald Macleod goes in search of that elusive Renaissance master, Josquin des Prez. Today, Petrucci's press boosts Josquin's fame.

Ottaviano Petrucci holds a special place in music history as the first printer to issue volumes of polyphonic music produced using movable type - making him a sort of musical Gutenberg. His opening salvo, in 1501, was the catchily titled Harmonice Musices Odhecaton - one hundred songs of harmonic music, an anthology of chansons by some of the leading composers of the day. Petrucci went on to publish several collections of Josquin's masses, whose dissemination throughout Europe spread the composer's reputation far and wide. The growth of music printing arguably also had a negative aspect, as it encouraged less scrupulous printers to market the work of lesser-known composers under the names of their more illustrious contemporaries - Josquin included. This practice has led in recent years to a radical shrinkage of Josquin's oeuvre, as more and more works once attributed to him are now considered to be by others.

La Bernardina
Fretwork

Missa Hercules dux ferrarie (Credo)
The Hilliard Ensemble
Paul Hillier, director

O Domine, Jesu Christe
A Sei Voci
Bernard Fabre-Garrus, director

Attrib Josquin: Absalon, fili mi
Oxford Camerata
Jeremy Summerly, director

Missa faisant regretz
The Medieval Ensemble Of London
Timothy Davies and Peter Davies, direction

Produced by Chris Barstow.