IN the sixteenth century, the Netherlands, or Low Countries, embraced the region including modern-day Belgium, Luxemburg, and the Netherlands, as well as, to the south, the French provinces of Artois and Hainault. These lands were drawn into the Habsburg Empire in the late fifteenth century through the marriage of Mary of Burgundy to Maximilian i (r. 1493–1519). During the era 1520–1560, Emperor Charles v (r. 1519–55) ruled the Netherlands from distant Madrid, placing regional authority with the regent of the Low Countries. Despite this regency, held by his aunt Marguerite of Austria (r. 1506–30) and his sister Mary of Hungary (r. 1531–55), the area was politically weak, divided by language and growing religious differences.

The revolt of the Netherlands against Spanish authority was brought on by complex religious, political, and economic issues that culminated in the outbreak of war in 1566. Lutheranism and Calvinism, introduced to the region by German and Swiss merchants, slowly gained sympathy and support among the free-thinking Netherlanders. The swift and violent response to the Protestant movement by Charles v only strengthened the Reform in the north, and many musicians were among those who converted to the new faiths.

The Netherlands was an urban culture in which musical activities were as strongly linked to cities as to the Burgundian-Habsburg courts. Ecclesiastical and civic support of the arts was manifested in the renowned choirs and thriving wind bands throughout the Low Countries. With the growing bourgeoisie, a new class of music consumers arose, who in turn supported the trades of music printing and publishing as well as instrument building.

In this era, important musical centers included, in the southern Netherlands, the cities of Antwerp, Brussels, Cambrai, Liège, Mechlin, Bruges, Ghent, and ‘s-Hertogenbosch, and in the northern Netherlands, Amsterdam, Utrecht, Leiden, and Haarlem. From the beginning of the sixteenth century, however, the cultural, artistic, and economic life of the Netherlands was focused in Antwerp.

The post-Josquin generation of Netherlandish composers

Northern composers living after 1520 generally took over and developed the compositional techniques of Josquin des Prez and his contemporaries.