The municipal company of musicians of Medina del Campo, 1566–1598

Abstract

Abstract In the second half of the 16th century the musicians of Medina del Campo came together to form a company in order to provide the music for all the celebrations taking place in their town. This initiative offers the possibility of broadening our knowledge about the functioning of municipal companies of musicians in the Spanish urban centres of the 16th century. The rich corpus of documents found in the regional archive of Valladolid permits the activity of this company to be traced in detail: how it was created, which musicians were involved, the regulations they followed, the patrons they worked for, the instruments they used, and how they taught their pupils. As will become apparent, the company of Medina del Campo functioned much like the guilds supporting many other trades, in which hierarchy, duties and communal good in both professional and social matters were carefully prescribed.