José Hinojosa
José Hinojosa
Genres: spanish, 17th century
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About José Hinojosa
José Hinojosa (d. Valencia, 30 December 1673) was a seventeenth-century Spanish maestro de capilla whose career linked the Aragonese city of Teruel with one of the most important musical institutions in Baroque Valencia, the Real Colegio-Seminario del Corpus Christi. Very little is known about his origins or early training, and the first secure traces place him in Calatayud, probably as chapelmaster of one of its two collegiate churches in the mid-seventeenth century. From there he emerged as a candidate of enough stature to be called to Teruel Cathedral, where in 1658 he was invited to compete for the vacant post of maestro de capilla. No other serious contender came forward and he was appointed by the chapter, taking over responsibility for the cathedral’s choirboys and a modest but functional group of ministriles and organ. At Teruel Hinojosa oversaw a small but active music chapel, training between six and eight infants and maintaining repertory for the principal offices and feasts. Chapter records show the usual mixture of trust and tension: in 1661 he was reprimanded for refusing to sing the first lesson at Matins on the feast of Santiago and for a perceived lack of deference toward his superiors, a reminder of the delicate balance a seventeenth-century chapelmaster had to strike between musical authority and institutional obedience. By the end of 1662 he had left Teruel, and the chapter again set about filling the position. Late in 1662 Hinojosa appears in a far more prestigious context: he was chosen as maestro de capilla of the Real Colegio-Seminario del Corpus Christi in Valencia, known as “El Patriarca”. The post had been held for decades in a kind of interim fashion by the contralto Marcos Pérez, who acted as chapel musician but did not compose for the liturgy. Once the college’s finances improved and the visitators insisted that a real chapelmaster be appointed, a full competition was organised. Although the formal examination jury rated other candidates, notably Luis Vicente Gargallo and Miguel Monjiu, more highly, the college authorities ultimately opted for Hinojosa and named him maestro in December 1662. The decision was controversial and the resulting dispute over his appointment dragged on for several years, but Hinojosa consolidated his position and remained in the post until his death. Life at the Corpus Christi college placed him at the centre of a rich musical environment. The institution maintained a choir of boys and clerics, an organ, and a substantial performing tradition around the daily offices and the elaborate celebration of Corpus Christi and its octave. Hinojosa’s duties combined composition, rehearsal, teaching and liturgical direction. Documents show the college reminding him to teach the choirboys within the institution rather than in his own house, and there are sporadic references to minor conflicts with other staff, but nothing to suggest a breakdown in his tenure. Among his pupils was Antonio Teodoro Ortells, who would go on to become maestro de capilla at Valencia Cathedral and one of the leading composers of the next generation; Hinojosa thus stands as an important link in the line of Valencian masters. In his final years his signature disappears from the weekly payment registers, suggesting illness or declining strength, but no interim maestro is recorded. Hinojosa died in Valencia in the early hours of 30 December 1673, and his funeral was celebrated on 2 January 1674. In his will he left his music—both his own works and compositions by others—to his brother Gregorio and to Ana María Pérez. The college purchased this musical legacy for a modest sum, and a significant portion of it has survived in the archives of Teruel Cathedral, the Patriarca in Valencia and later copybooks. The extant works, though limited in number compared with later eighteenth-century figures, show a capable Baroque chapelmaster writing for between six and eight voices in the established Iberian idiom, with a particular emphasis on psalms, lamentations and other pieces suitable for the Divine Office. Through both his compositions and his teaching, Hinojosa helped shape the sound of sacred music in Teruel and Valencia in the decades immediately before the great flowering represented by Ortells and his contemporaries.
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