Hellinck, Lupus [Wulfaert]

(b ?Axel, c1494; d Bruges, c14 Jan 1541). Netherlandish composer. A son of Johannes Hellinck from the diocese of Utrecht, he became a choirboy at St Donatian, Bruges, on 24 March 1506. When his voice broke in 1511 he was sent away to school, returning as a verger on 16 November 1513. At the end of 1515 he left to study for the priesthood, for which he supplicated in Rome in April 1518 while in papal service; later that month he was granted an indult since he was leaving Rome (Sherr, pp.xi–xii). From the supplication document we learn that he was 24 years old and held a perpetual chaplaincy of the altar of St Nicholas in St John’s Hospital, Bruges. Hellinck may be identifiable with the ‘Lupo francese/fiammengo cantore’ documented in the service of Sigismondo d’Este in Ferrara from June 1518 to the end of April 1519 (Lockwood, 1979, pp.198–9); whether he is the author of motets signed ‘Lupus’ in sources of that time is doubtful on stylistic grounds (see Lupus). On 19 October 1519 Hellinck was readmitted to St Donatian as an installed cleric, where his duties included singing in the polyphonic choir. Two years later he became succentor of the church of Our Lady, Bruges, returning to St Donatian to take up the same position on 17 June 1523. The account rendered by his executors a year after his death establishes the correct Flemish spelling of his first name, Wulfaert, and that he had a son called Wulfuekin. He is called ‘Lupus’ in the church records only after he became succentor, in accordance with the custom to latinize names on reaching a certain station. Hellinck’s music was published in Italy, France, Germany and the Netherlands and is found in manuscripts as far apart as Portugal and Poland. Many sources give only the name Lupus; conflicting attributions with Johannes Lupi are rare.

Hellinck was a master craftsman. He was particularly interested in thematic unification and used a number of techniques to achieve it. The considerable variety of his melodic and rhythmic lines is balanced by a fairly smooth dissonance technique and a fine feeling for form. The two partes of his motets usually contain about the same number of bars, and points of imitation are normally of the same length; occasionally a short theme group is balanced by a longer one. He did not use cantus firmus or canon, rarely paraphrased a chant melody, and avoided sequences and chordal sections, preferring an evenly flowing polyphony achieved through the use of pervading imitation.

Hellinck’s main contribution is to the mass; he wrote 13 parody masses, all in a surprisingly uniform technique. His parody procedure does not involve quoting substantial vertical passages from the model, except in the Missa ‘In te Domine speravi’, based on his own motet. He preferred to develop new contrapuntal combinations based on themes from the model. He unified his masses by drawing repeatedly on the same themes and by reiterating passages from earlier sections of the mass to a different text. Extensive use of such self-borrowing occurs especially in the Agnus Dei sections, which serve as thoughtful codas to his masses; only the Missa ‘In te Domine speravi’ has a newly-composed Agnus Dei. Self-borrowing is particularly evident in Missa ‘Veni sponsa Christi’, which has at least 25 repeated passages, ranging from four to 19 bars. Hellinck followed traditional procedures in using themes from the first part of the model in consecutive order in the Kyrie, the first sections of the Gloria and Credo, the Sanctus proper and the first Agnus Dei. Themes from the second part of the model are used consecutively in the ‘Qui tollis’ section of the Gloria, the final section of the Credo, the ‘Osanna’ and the last Agnus Dei. The ‘Domine Deus’ section of the Gloria and the Benedictus are usually freely composed. With two exceptions, the ‘Et incarnatus’ is set in threefold repetition in slow chords, interspersed with brief imitative passages.

Hellinck’s earlier works tend towards tonal and formal clarity; the psalm motets Beati omnes, In te Domine speravi and Qui confidunt in Domino, and the well-known Panis quem ego dabo are good examples. These works clearly show the influence of Josquin, although they do not have the airiness of texture of Josquin’s psalm motets. Hellinck’s later compositions, particularly the motets O veneranda martyrum, Joannes Jesu Christo and the motet in honour of St Donatian, Cursu festa dies, seem to reflect Gombert’s influence. Short imitations develop into long melismatic lines in which the text takes a subordinate position. Cadences are avoided by extensive overlapping in a uniformly dense texture, which does not have paired imitation and other contrasts in vocal scoring. Self-borrowing also occurs in the motets.

Hellinck’s 11 German chorales, published posthumously by Georg Rhau in 1544 and perhaps commissioned by him, are written in motet style, with the chorale tune in the tenor, sometimes in breves but often rhythmically similar to the other three voices. They indicate that Hellinck, although a Catholic priest, was sympathetic to the Reformation, a thesis reinforced by his participation, at the competition of Chambers of Rhetoric in Ghent in 1539, in a play that was later placed on the Index.

WORKS

only principal sources given

Edition:Newe deudsche geistliche Gesenge, 1544, ed. J. Wolf, DDT, xxxiv (1908/R) [W]

masses

motets

chorales

chansons

flemish songs

doubtful works

BIBLIOGRAPHY

MGG1 (H. Albrecht)

A.C. de Schrevel: Histoire du séminaire de Bruges, i (Bruges, 1895)

J. Schmidt-Görg: ‘Vier Messen aus dem XVI. Jahrhundert über die Motette “Panis quem ego dabo” des Lupus Hellinck’, KJb, xxv (1930), 76–93

R.B. Lenaerts: Het Nederlands polifonies lied in de zestiende eeuw (Mechelen and Amsterdam, 1933)

H. Albrecht: ‘Lupus Hellinck und Johannes Lupi’, AcM, vi (1934), 54–65

H. Osthoff: Die Niederländer und das deutsche Lied, 1400–1640 (Berlin, 1938/R), 89–97

R.B. Lenaerts: ‘Les messes de Lupus Hellinck du manuscrit 766 de Montserrat’, Miscelánea en homenaje a Monseñor Higinio Anglés (Barcelona, 1958–61), 465–74

L. Lockwood: ‘A Continental Mass and Motet in a Tudor Manuscript’, ML, xlii (1961), 336–47

A. Viane: ‘Zangmeester Wulfaert Hellinc van Brugge op het rederijkersfeest te Gent 1539’, Biekorf, lxviii (1967), 153–4

M. Antonowycz: ‘Das Parodieverfahren in der Missa Mater Patris von Lupus Hellinck’, Renaissance-Muziek 1400–1600: Donum natalicium René Bernard Lenaerts, ed. J. Robijns (Leuven, 1969), 33–8

J. Graziano: ‘Lupus Hellinck: a Survey of Fourteen Masses’, MQ, lvi (1970), 247–69

B.J. Blackburn: The Lupus Problem (diss., U. of Chicago, 1970)

A. Viane: ‘Wulfaert Hellinck van Axel, zangmeester van de St Donaaskerk te Brugge: zijn optreden te Gent in 1539’, Biekorf, lxxi (1970), 109–10

A. Dewitte: ‘Wulfaert Hellinck van Axel, zangmeester van Sint-Donaas te Brugge: uitvoering van zijn testament 1541–1542’, Biekorf, lxxiii (1972), 355–8

B.J. Blackburn: ‘Johannes Lupi and Lupus Hellinck: a Double Portrait’, MQ, lix (1973), 547–83

L. Lockwood: ‘Jean Mouton and Jean Michel: New Evidence on French Music and Musicians in Italy 1505–1520’, JAMS, xxxii (1979), 191–246, esp. 198–9

R. Sherr: Introduction to Selections from Bologna, Civico Museo Bibliografico Musicale, MS Q 19 (‘Rusconi’), SCMot, vi–vii (1989)

BONNIE J. BLACKBURN