Pierre Alamire

Pierre Alamire (also Petrus Alamire; probable birth name Peter van den Hove; c. 1470 – 26 June 1536) was a German-Dutch music copyist, composer, instrumentalist, mining engineer, merchant, diplomat and spy of the Renaissance. He was one of the most skilled music scribes of his time, and many now-famous works of Franco-Flemish composers owe their survival to his renowned illuminated manuscript copies; in addition he was a spy for the court of Henry VIII of England.

He was born to a family of merchants in Nuremberg, Bavaria, Holy Roman Empire but came to the Seventeen Provinces at an early age. Alamire was not his real name; the name was a musical reference, "A" (the musical pitch) plus the solfege syllables "la", "mi" and "re" (scale steps six, three and two respectively). Most likely his actual name was van den Hove (or Imhoff, Imhove), although details on his family background are slim.

In the late 1490s he began to receive commissions for work in the Low Countries, for example at 's-Hertogenbosch and Antwerp, where his impressive skill at musical copying and illuminating were immediately valued. This was the period when the explosion of musical creativity in the Low Countries was at its highest; that region was producing more composers than all of the rest of Europe combined, and these composers were emigrating into other areas, especially into royal and aristocratic courts who had the means to employ them.

By 1503 Alamire had already created an edition of music for Philip I of Castile, and by 1509 he was an employee of Archduke Charles, shortly to become Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor. His manuscripts were to become extremely valuable as gifts, as most European nobility at the time prized music, and many votes for the upcoming election of the Holy Roman Emperor would need to be bought.

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