Josquin Lebloitte dit des Prez, known as Josquin des Prez (or simply Josquin), was a composer and singer of Renaissance music, born around 1450–1455 in French-speaking Flanders and died 27 August 1521 in Condé-sur-l’Escaut. A central figure of the Franco-Flemish School, he sang in the chapel of René of Anjou by 1477, later served Cardinal Ascanio Sforza in Milan, sang in the papal choir in Rome (1489–c.1494), and spent his final years, from 1504, in Condé, where he composed some of his most admired late works, including the Missa de Beata Virgine and Missa Pange lingua. His surviving output centers on masses, motets, and secular chansons built from a complex, text-driven imitative polyphony that built on and surpassed the style of predecessors like Johannes Ockeghem.

Josquin has been described as the first Western composer to retain lasting posthumous fame: his music was extensively printed by Ottaviano Petrucci, widely performed and imitated throughout 16th-century Europe, and praised by figures including Martin Luther and the theorist Heinrich Glarean. His emphasis on the relationship between text and music, and his preference for motivic development over melisma, set a model that shaped Renaissance vocal composition for generations. Long revered, then reassessed by 20th-century early-music scholarship as attributions were reexamined, Josquin’s core works remain foundational to the choral and early-music repertoire, and his 500th anniversary in 2021 was marked by celebrations worldwide.

Sources:

• https://www.britannica.com/biography/Josquin-des-Prez