Johannes Ciconia

He was the son of a priest (also named Johannes Ciconia) and a woman of high social standing. Since at least three other men around Liège had that name as well, this has created biographical confusion, first solved by David Fallows in 1975. A Johannes Ciconia, probably the composer's father, worked in Avignon in 1350 as a clerk for the wife of Pope Clement VI's nephew. Another Johannes Ciconia is recorded in Liège in 1385 as a duodenus, generally identifying a person of young age; scholars agree that this is the composer himself. Papal records suggest that Ciconia was in the service of Philppe d'Alençon, a powerful French cardinal of the schismatic Pope Boniface IX. He is believed to have worked as a clericus capelle, an important job usually held by younger musicians. His whereabouts between the early 1390s and 1401 are generally undocumented, however, due to his service to Cardinal d’Alençon, he may have been in Rome. From 1401 until his death in 1412, he was chaplain at the cathedral of Padua and a benefice at St. Biagio di Roncalea Church. From 1401 until his death in 1412, he was connected to the cathedral of Padua in some capacity, likely in the service of archpriest Francesco Zabarella for whom he wrote the motet Doctorum Principum. However, it is unclear whether Ciconia arrived in Padua even earlier than 1401. His lament Con lagrime bagnadome is described in one source as written for the death of Francesco of Carrara – if this refers to Francesco il Nuovo ("the New"), it would date from after 1406; if, however, it was written for the death of Francesco il Vecchio ("the Old"), as scholars have assumed, this would place him in Padua as early as 1393. There is also the possibility of an intermediate stay in Pavia (as suggested by the scholars John Nádas and Agostino Ziino), on the grounds that this is where he would have connected with the House of Visconti and acquired knowledge of the ars subtilior style and the compositions of Philippus de Caserta quoted in his Sus un' fontayne ("Under a fountain") (see below). Ciconia likely lived a very comfortable life with a substantial measure of wealth due to his successes within the church.

Ciconia's music is an eclectic blend of styles. Pieces typical of northern Italy, such as his madrigal Una panthera, appear with pieces steeped in the French ars nova. The more complex ars subtilior style surfaces in Sus un' fontayne. While it remains late medieval in style, his writing increasingly points toward the melodic patterning of the Renaissance, for instance in his setting of O rosa bella. He wrote music both secular (French virelais, Italian ballate and madrigals) and sacred (motets and Mass movements, some of them isorhythmic) in form. He is also the author of two treatises on music, Nova Musica and De Proportionibus (which expands on some ideas in Nova Musica). His theoretical ideas stem from the more conservative Marchettian tradition in contrast to those of his Paduan contemporary Prosdocimus de Beldemandis. Although contrafacts and later manuscript sources of his compositions suggest that he was well known in Florence, his music is scarcely represented in major Florentine sources of the period; for instance, the Squarcialupi Codex contains nothing by Ciconia. But many of his motets and Mass movements are included in the manuscript known as "Bologna MS Museo Internazionale e Biblioteca della Musica Q15". There exist two complete editions of Ciconia’s surviving compositions. One written by Suzanne Clercyx as a second volume to her 1956 monograph entitled Johannes Ciconia: un musician liegeous et son temps. This edition (while impressive) consisted only of hand-written copies done by Clercyx herself, and was later found to include many musical errors in transcription. The second The Works of Johannes Ciconia was compiled by scholars Margaret Bent and Anne Hallmark in 1985. The Bent/Hallmark edition sparked controversy over editorship in complete editions; causing the authors to argue for the scholarly integrity of informed manuscript editing. The two editions paint very different pictures of Ciconia as a composer. The Clercyx edition initially portrayed Ciconia as an older man (due to the long term scholarly confusion between his father and himself) with innovative figure with daring intervals and melodic lines. However, the more recent and more definitive edition views these daring “choices” as mistakes. This leads scholars to believe that while Ciconia was an incredibly popular composer for his time he was not exactly the innovator that previous research may have suggested. Scholars praise the new collection for bringing new light to both the understanding and music of the composer (see below).