Is apotheosizing a composer well worth? Josquin des Prez is an unavoidable figure when we discuss renaissance music, like Beethoven for classical music. However unlike in the case of Beethoven, there is not enough definite evidences to support the greatness of Josquin. The author Paula Higgins claimed this Josquin-movement has more political meaning beyond the musicological purpose in her article “The Apotheosis of Josquin des Prez and
Other Mythologies of Musical Genius”.
Higgins was obsessed with any possible conspiracy behind the Josquin apotheosis. Basically, she did not agree that Josquin is superior than every composer in Renaissance and she blamed Lowinsky for getting his own reputation by apotheosizing Josquin. After the Josquin-conference held in 1971, the genius character of Josquin has been established by Lowinsky and his colleagues, which Higgins found it was very sudden and abrupt, considering the …show more content…
Despite of this article, her researches also contribute to women right and social justice. She offered an alternative way to study the renaissance music that musicologist could focus on the works themselves rather than who wrote them, since we do not have as much remaining material from renaissance era as later periods like romantic and classical. In my opinion, we need a hero like Josquin for a style. There is no deny that classical music is dying. I believe no matter whether Josquin is qualified for the recognition he received 500 years later, his name prompts the numbers of researches about that period, which Higgins mentioned about in her own paper. Without Mendelssohn, we do not know Bach; without Lang Lang, there were not millions of Chinese children who picked up piano. In addition, in the case of Lang Lang, despite of the controversy of his artistic taste, his influence inspired the whole country of China to become the biggest market of classic