(fl c1448). German organist and composer, author of one of the earliest German organ tablatures, dated 1448 (since 1981 in a private collection, previously US-PHci; ed. in CEKM, i). Its title, as the sole source of information concerning his life, indicates that he was a Franciscan brother and rector of the town school at Stendal in the March of Brandenburg. As such he might have served as organist of the Marienkirche, which was consecrated in 1447.
The tablature consists of only seven folios 14·2 x 10·7 cm (the incorrect measurements, 28 x 21 cm, hitherto published, together with other mistakes in description based on Apel's research, have led to untenable hypotheses with respect to the significance of the source) containing eight settings. Five are free preludes with metrically undefined discant declamation over sustained notes in one or two parts in the pedals. They resemble similar pieces in the Erlangen tablature (D-ERu 554), obviously representing early practices in organ improvisation. The remaining three settings (mensurae) of the secular cantus firmus Frowe al myn hoffen an dyr lyed display strict mensural organization in two- or three-part writing, sometimes with additional notes to fill in the harmony. The primitive, ambiguous and partly faulty notation of all pieces prohibits conclusive decipherment.
The composition of the pieces is of much lower quality than that of the south German Paumann circle, particularly with respect to the rudimentary three-part setting and the mechanical discant figuration. The significance of the tablature has been over-emphasized, due to the general lack of sources of 15th-century keyboard music. The fact that Ileborgh as a musician is totally unknown beyond this tablature, taken together with the notational and stylistic peculiarities, suggests that he was an average peripheral figure in 15th-century organ music.
See also Tablature and Sources of keyboard music to 1660, §2(iii).
W. Apel: ‘Die Tabulatur des Adam Ileborgh’, ZMw, xvi (1934), 193–212
G. Knoche: ‘Der Organist Adam Ileborgh von Stendal: Beiträge zur Erforschung seiner Lebensumstände’, Franziskanische Studien, xxviii (1941), 53–62
G. Most: ‘Die Orgeltabulatur von 1448 des Adam Ileborgh aus Stendal’, Altmärkisches Museum Stendal, viii (1954), 43–80
A. Reichling: ‘Die Präambeln der Hs. Erlangen 554 und ihre Beziehung zur Sammlung Ileborghs’, GfMKB: Kassel 1962, 109–11
C. Wolff: ‘Arten der Mensuralnotation im 15. Jahrhundert und die Anfänge der Orgeltabulatur’, GfMKB: Bonn 1970, 609–13
L. Richter: ‘Praeambeln und Mensurae: Studien zur Orgeltabulatur des Adam Ileborgh’, BMw, xxiii (1981), 265–308
U. Konrad: ‘Aufzeichnungsform und Werkbegriff in der frühen Orgeltabulatur’, Literatur, Musik und Kunst im Übergang vom Mittelalter zur Neuzeit, ed. H. Boockmann and others (Göttingen, 1995), 162–86
For further bibliography see Keyboard music and Sources of keyboard music to 1660.
CHRISTOPH WOLFF