Marbrianus de Orto (also known as Marbriano de Orto, Marbrianus; original surname Dujardin; c. 1460 – January or February 1529) was a Flemish composer of the Renaissance, belonging to the Franco-Flemish school. He was a contemporary, close associate, and possible friend of Josquin des Prez, and was one of the first composers to write a completely canonic setting of the Ordinary of the Mass.
Life
The illegitimate child of a priest, Orto was probably born in Tournai and spent the early part of his life there. Although his original surname was Dujardin, he used "de Orto" (the Italian translation of Dujardin) throughout his life. In June 1482, in the household of Ferry de Clugny, Cardinal-Bishop of Tournai, he traveled to Rome, where he became a singer in the papal chapel. He may have become an accomplished composer around this time, since his Missa ad fugam appears to have been written in response to a similar composition by Josquin des Prez, tentatively dated to the early 1480s; Orto's mass was copied for the Cappella Sistina between 1487 and 1490.
He served in the Sistine Chapel Choir until at least 1499, during the papacies of Innocent VIII and Alexander VI, while also acquiring other posts and benefices. He was particularly favored by Innocent, who awarded him benefices and allowed him to rise in the hierarchy despite his illegitimacy. During this period he and Josquin worked closely together, even seeking similar positions at Cambrai. At some point in the early 1490s, Orto acquired the post of dean at the Collegiate Church of St. Gertrude of Nivelles (present-day Belgium), an institution with which he remained associated for the rest of his life.
In late 1504, Orto left Nivelles to join the choir of Philip the Handsome, known as la Grande Chapelle, a distinguished musical body that included Pierre de La Rue and traveled to Spain in 1506. Orto joined at a high level, becoming premier chapelain by 30 November 1505. After Philip's death in September 1506, the choir was retained by Juana of Castile ("Juana the Mad"), and Orto was among the singers who left shortly thereafter, between October and December 1506, leaving the duties of premier chapelain to Pierre de La Rue.
Back in the Low Countries, Orto remained in the employ of the Habsburgs from at least 1509 until 1517, sharing the duties of premier chapelain with Anthoine de Berghes. During this period he was likely the teacher of Arnold von Bruck, who was a choirboy. In his later years he acquired additional posts as canon at the Antwerp Church of Our Lady and at St. Gudule in Brussels. A record from 1518 lists him as the "first chaplain" in the Flemish chapel (capilla flamenca) of Charles V. He possibly died of the plague that swept through Nivelles in 1529 and was buried in the church of St. Gertrude, where he had worked for the longest time. His tomb inscription remained legible until the church was destroyed by German forces on 14 May 1940, during the Second World War.
Music and influence
Marbrianus de Orto was a moderately prolific composer of masses, motets, lamentations, and chansons, many of which have survived. He was sufficiently renowned that Ottaviano Petrucci published a book of his masses in 1505—one of his earliest publications and one of the earliest collections of printed music. This book of masses followed those by Josquin, Jacob Obrecht, Antoine Brumel, Johannes Ghiselin, Pierre de La Rue, and Alexander Agricola.
Petrucci published five of de Orto's masses in this collection, all of which are cantus firmus masses, including a Missa L'homme armé based on the famous tune, probably composed in the early to mid-1480s. Among his masses is the unusual Missa ad fugam, one of only a handful of freely composed canonic masses from the period, alongside Johannes Ockeghem's Missa prolationum, based entirely on mensuration canons. De Orto's Missa ad fugam may be related to another canonic mass in a Vatican manuscript, later named Missa ad fugam and attributed to Josquin by Petrucci. Both masses use strict canon at the fifth between superius and tenor, as well as a head motive in most movements.
De Orto's motets also typically use cantus firmus technique. The Salve regis mater sanctissima, though anonymous in its only surviving source, is probably by de Orto and was composed for the accession of Alexander VI in 1492. Some of his chansons resemble the typical French style of the early 16th century—quick, light, and imitative—while others align more with the Burgundian style of the formes fixes. De Orto also wrote an early setting of Dido's lament, Dulces exuviae, from the Aeneid (IV.651–4), containing extensive chromatic writing.
