A Dictionary of Music and Musicians/Tylman Susato

by Reginald Lane-Poole

TYLMAN SUSATO, printer and composer of music, was born at or near Cologne probably towards the end of the fifteenth century. His name is regularly written by himself in the full form given above, although the spelling of the first part of it is extremely irregular.^[1] A document referred to by Fétis^[2] describes Susato as 'son of Tylman.' It is therefore only through an inexplicable forgetfulness of diplomatic usage that Fétis and others^[3] have taken Tylman for a surname.^[4] These writers have also accepted a conjecture of Dehn^[5] that 'Susato' indicated the place of the composer's birth, namely the town of Soest (Susatam): in one of his books, however, he expressly describes himself as 'Agrippinensis,'^[6] which can only refer to Cologne.^[7] Consequently we have to consider 'Susato' (or 'de Susato'—as it once occurs, in a document^[8] of 1543) as a family-name, 'van (or 'von') Soest,' doubtless originally derived from the Westphalian town. By the year 1529 Tylman is found settled at Antwerp, where he maintained himself by transcribing music for the chapel of the Virgin in the cathedral; in 1531 he is mentioned as taking part, as trumpeter, in the performance of certain masses there. He was also one of the five musicians supported by the city ('stadsspeellieden'), and as such possessed, according to a list of 1532, two trumpets, a 'velt-trompet,' and a 'teneur-pipe.' Losing his post on the arrival of Philip II in 1549, he appears, for some unexplained reason, never to have been again employed by the city. Before this date however he had found another occupation as a printer of music. For a short time^[9] he worked in company with some friends; but from 1543 onwards he published on his own account, bringing out between that year and 1561 more than fifty volumes of music, nearly every one of which contains some compositions of his own. He died before 1564.^[10]

Susato's first publication is entitled 'Premier Livre de Chansons à quatre Parties, au quel sont contenues trente et une nouvelles Chansons convenables tant à la Voix comme aux Instrumentz.' Eight of these pieces are by himself. The rest of his publications, so far as they are now extant, include (1) in French, sixteen books of 'Chansons' in 3–8 parts; (2) Madrigali e Canzoni francesi a 5 voci' (1558); (3) in Latin 3 books of 'Carmina,' 3 of Masses, one of 'Evangelia Dominicarum,' 15 of 'Ecclesiasticæ Cantiones' or motets (1553–1560), 'Motecta quinis vocibus, auctore Clemente non Papa' (1546), and 5 books of 'Cantionea sacrae quae vulgo Moteta vocant' [sic] (1546). Finally (4) in Dutch there are his three books of songs, etc., entitled 'Musyck boexken,' and one book (1561), apparently the second of a series of 'Sauter-Liedekens' (Psalter-ditties), which are of peculiar interest. The third of the Musyck boexken contains some dances by Susato himself, which are described^[11] as 'full of character' and excellently written. The souterliedekens, which Ambros further^[12] states to be found in four more Musyck-boexken, are pieces from the Psalms according to the rhymed Flemish version, set without change to the popular song-tunes of the day ('gemeyne bekende liedekens.'^[13]) The charm however of these compositions lies less in the airs adapted in them than in the independence and originality of the part-writing, an art in which Susato was so proficient that some of his three-part songs are composed in such a manner as to be suitable, he states, equally for three and for two voices with omission of the bass. Susato appears also to have co-operated with Clemens non Papa in some of his work, and not to have been merely his publisher. Still it is as a publisher^[14] that Susato has hitherto been almost exclusively known, the masters whose works he printed being very numerous, and including such names as Crequillon, Gombert, Groudimel, O. de Lassus, P. de Manchicourt, J. Mouton, C. de Eore, A. Willaert, etc.

[ R. L. P. ]

1. In works with Latin titles Susato writes himself in a great majority of cases Tilemannus: Tielmannus, Tilmannut, Tylemannus, and Tilmannut, occurring but rarely. In Flemish his favourite form seems to have been Tielman. In French Tylman, the spelling adapted by Fétis and Mendel is found most frequently; Thielman, which is preferred by M. Goovaerts is less usual; while Tilman, the spelling which is adopted by M. vander Straeten and is now practically the accepted one in the Netherlands, is met with only twice.
2. Biogr. univ. des Music., viii. 276; 2nd ed.
3. Thus Mendel and Beissmann, Musikal. Convers.-Lex. x. 355; Berlin, 1881.
4. Cp. Alphonse Goovaerts, Histoire et Bibliographie de la Typographie musicale dans les Pays-bas, pp. 26. 27; Antwerp, 1880.
5. See his letter in Fétis, l.c.
6. Goovaerts, p. 191.
7. At the same time, M. Goovaerts notes (pp. 26, 27), we are not to confound Susato, as Fétis and Mendel have done, with a contemporary Thielman van Ceulen, who was a brewer, and whose father's name was Adolf.
8. Edmond vander Straeten, La Musique aux Pays-bas avant le xixme Siècle. v. 258; Brussels, 1880.
9. Goovaerts. pp. 18–26.
10. Ibid. p. 31.
11. Vander Straeten, v. 261, who says that these dances have been reprinted by Eitner in the Monatshefte für Musikgeschichte, Jahrg. vii. No. 6.
12. Geschichte der Musik, iii. 813 (Breslau, 1868). These however are not mentioned by M. Goovaerts, whose general accuracy may lead one to suspect a mistake on Ambros' part.
13. Ambros, iii. 313.
14. His publications are rarely found in England, the British Museum only possessing one volume of masses.