(d Ferrara, 1564). French organist and composer. A certain Jacques Brunel vacated an organist's post at Rouen Cathedral in December 1524. He was probably the same Brunel who was organist at the Este chapel from early 1532 until 1564. Thus from 1547 to 1558 he would have served under Cipriano de Rore. During the years 1543–59 Brunel received money for the keep of a horse, apparently for travel to Modena and Reggio nell'Emilia to oversee the Este chapels there; he is also known to have spent some time in Pesaro and Urbino, at the request of Duke Guidubaldo II of Urbino, in the summer of 1534 and during the period 1561–3. He was last paid in March 1564 and had died by May. It is not known whether he was related to Antoine Brumel who was at Ferrara from 1506 to 1510.
The few 16th-century references to Brunel make it clear that he was regarded as an outstanding organist. Jacopo Corfini (Primo libro de motetti, Venice, 1571), Luigi Dentice (Due dialoghi della musica, Naples, 1552), and Cinciarino (Introduttorio, Venice, 1555) praised him. In Ragionamenti accademici (Venice, 1567) Cosimo Bartoli said that ‘he plays with more grace, with more art and more musically than any other, whoever he may be’. Brunel was succeeded by a son, Virginio, who was organist at the Cathedral of Ravenna from August 1572 until some time after 1580.
Anthony Newcomb has made the case that 14 anonymous ricercares preserved in the so-called Bourdeney Codex (F-Pn Rés.Vm 851), four of which are attributed to ‘Giaches’ in I-Rvat Chigi Q.VIII.206, were composed by Brunel in the 1550s and 60s. If so, they show him to have been a major innovator in the genre. They are rigidly contrapuntal, based on between one and four subjects. In multi-thematic pieces the various themes are closely related through evolving variation, often using inganno, inversion or augmentation, and the works often employ countersubjects as well.
Edition: The Ricercars of the Bourdeney Codex, ed. A. Newcomb, RRMR, lxxxix (1991) [N]
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Messa de la dominica (‘Jaches’), I-CARc; ed. in Jeppesen (1943) |
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Ricercare di Jaches (in F), CARc; ed. in Slim |
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Ricercare di Jaches (in d), CARc; ed. in Jeppesen (1943) |
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Recercare del nono tuono, F-Pn, N |
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Ricercar sopra la sol fa re mi, Pn, I-Rvat, S-Uu (‘Giaches organista’), N |
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Ricercar del terzo tono, F-Pn, I-Rvat, N |
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Ricercar del nono tono, F-Pn, N |
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Ricercar del quinto tono, Pn, I-Rvat, N |
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Ricercar del duodicesimo tono, F-Pn, I-Rvat, N |
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Ricercare del primo tono, F-Pn, N |
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Ricercare del primo tono, Pn, N |
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Ricercare del secondo tono, Pn, N |
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Ricercare del seconto tono, Pn, N |
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Ricercare del terzo tono, Pn, N |
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Ricercare del quarto tono, Pn, N |
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Ricercare del duodecimo tono, Pn, N |
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Ricercare sopra Cantai mentre ch'i arsi [di] Cypriano [de Rore], Pn, N |
ApelG
Vander StraetenMPB, vi
K. Jeppesen, ed.: Die italienische Orgelmusik am Anfang des Cinquecento (Copenhagen, 1943, enlarged 2/1960)
A.-M. Bautier-Regnier: ‘Jachet de Mantoue (Jacobus Collebaudi) v. 1500–1559: contribution à l'étude du problème des Jachet au XVIe s.’, RBM, vi (1952), 101–19
K. Jeppesen: ‘Eine frühe Orgelmesse aus Castell’Arquato’, AMw, xii (1955), 187–205
H.C. Slim: The Keyboard Ricercar and Fantasia in Italy, ca. 1500–1550, with Reference to Parallel Forms in European Lute Music of the Same Period (diss., Harvard U., 1961)
C. MacClintock: ‘The “Giaches Fantasias” in MS Chigi Q VIII 206: a Problem in Identification’, JAMS, xix (1966), 370–82
G. Nugent: The Jaquet Motets and their Authors (diss., Princeton U., 1973)
F. Piperno: ‘Guidubaldo II della Rovere: la musica e il mondo’, Saggiatore musicale, iv (1997), 249–70 [incl. Eng. summary]
BARTON HUDSON