Il sera pour vous/L’Homme arme (It will be for you/The Armed man) – Robert Morton

Il sera pour vous/L’Homme arme (It will be for you/The Armed man) by Robert Morton

There are no confirmed records detailing exactly when the composer Robert Morton was born, however what records are available indicate the composer was born some time around 1430 in England. By 1457 Morton had travelled to Burgundy and was appointed chappellain of the court choir. By 1460 he was promoted to a full priest.

Unfortunately, very few of the compositions Morton completed before his death in 1479 remain. In particular, all of his sacred music has been lost. This is primarily due to the Dissolution of the Monasteries, a process begun in 1531 and ratified in 1536, and would result in the destruction of much of the English sacred music of the 15th century, and the first few decades of the 16th.

The compositions that have remained are all secular works. This particular piece is a setting of the song ‘L’Homme arme’, a popular Burgundian tune adapted in many musical settings. It is believed that this adaptation was done by Morton as a farewell gift for a fellow composer, Simon le Breton, and as such dates the work to around May of 1464.

There are no confirmed paintings or sketches of Robert Morton. The cover picture is a painting of King Edward IV of England (the monarch in 1464). The image during the video is the ‘Medici Madonna’ by the Dutch painter Rogier van der Weyden, done at some time between 1460 and 1464.