OCKEGHEM 2 | the sound and the fury
Johannes Ockeghem is a truly enigmatic personality to us today, both as man and composer. Whilst his surname refers to a small village, Okegem, in eastern Flanders, we first come across him listed as «vicaire-chanteur» among the singers of Antwerp‘s
Liebfrauenkirche in 1443. We do not know when he was born, but the fact that he wrote a mass based on the tenor of a chanson by the famous composer Gilles de Binche, «Binchoys», and also an impressive Lamento as obituary, may suggest that Ockeghem received his musical training in Mons where Binchoys was organist of St. Waudru from 1419 to 1423, an institution with which he was to remain in contactuntil his death.
