George de La Hèle

George de La Hèle (also Georges, Helle, Hele) (1547 – August 27, 1586) was a Franco-Flemish composer of the Renaissance, mainly active in the Habsburg chapels of Spain and the Low Countries. Among his surviving music is a book of eight masses, some for as many as eight voices. While he was a prolific composer during his time in Spain, much of his music was destroyed in 1734 in the burning of the chapel library in Madrid.

Life

La Hèle was born in Antwerp, and received his musical training both there and possibly at Soignies. He spent his teenage years as a choirboy in Madrid, in the chapel of Philip II, then led by Pierre de Manchicourt, another northern composer who spent much of his career in Spain; Manchicourt probably identified the young La Hèle himself on one of his talent-scouting trips to his own homeland. After singing as a choirboy for several years, in the late 1560s La Hèle went to study at the University of Alcalá, and in 1570 returned north, enrolling at the University of Leuven. While his course of study has not been documented, it is presumed he studied not music but theology. He seems not to have achieved the priesthood, but rose high enough in the Church hierarchy to be eligible for benefices.

La Hèle was evidently highly regarded, certainly by Philip II, and the publication of his masses was an unusually opulent one – but Plantin's business sense was sufficient to require La Hèle himself to buy forty copies of his own book to help with the cost of printing (although at a discount: 16 florins instead of the usual price of 18).

Recordings Missa Praeter rerum seriem, 1578: Kyrie, Sanctus and Agnus Dei in 2017 album Vecchi Requiem Rubens's funeral and the Antwerp Baroque by Graindelavoix under the direction of Björn Schmelzer.