Presentation

Prosopography of Renaissance Singers is a database of biographies of professional singers who worked in the European chapels from 1350 to 1600. The database collects 4557 entries and offers a wide variety of information, from the variant names of the singers to their dates and places of activities,  together with their complete and detailed biographies. This is a project in progress, periodically enriched with newly released biographies.

The project began in 2007 with a research campaign funded by the French National Agency of Research (ANR), in collaboration with the University of Rouen, the Centre d’études supérieures de la Renaissance (CESR) of the University of Tours, the CNRS and Le STUDIUM agency. The database collects the results of biographical research concerning singers active in the institutions of France, the Low Countries and Italy, but also considers the activities of singers in Spain, Germany and other European countries.

There are different kinds of entries in the database. The user will find entries in progress, which propose just a few pieces of information, as well as complete entries, available in French and English. The user can query these by full-text search. (Queries in French are more successful than in English, as a large number of biographies are in French.)

Musicologists interested in having more details or consulting biographies in progress are invited to contact David Fiala.