Ninot le Petit

Ninot le Petit (also Johannes Parvi) (fl. ca. 1500 – 1520) was a French composer of the Renaissance, probably associated with the French royal chapel. Although a substantial amount of his music has survived in several sources, his actual name is not known with certainty. Life Two identifications have been proposed by musicologists in the latter half of the 20th century. The first possibility, suggested by Barton Hudson in 1979, is that le Petit may have been Johannes Baltazar alias le Petit, since a singer of that name was in the papal chapel between 1488 and 1502, and his name resembles that in the attribution of some “le Petit” motets in a Vatican manuscript. The second possibility is that “le Petit” may be the same as Jean Lepetit, the singing master at Langres Cathedral between 1506 and 1510. Baltazar died in 1502, Lepetit after 1529; stylistically the music of le Petit suggests composition in the first two decades of the 16th century. Music and influence Le Petit’s style is similar to that of Antoine de Févin and Jean Mouton, the two most famous French composers associated with the French royal chapel. He preferred clear harmonies, a texture occasionally broken by long duets,