Transforming the Motet: Sigmund Salminger and the Adaptation and Reuse of Franco-Flemish Polyphony in Reformation Augsburg

This dissertation explores the different ways that motets were recontextualized, adapted, and transformed by German musicians during the mid-sixteenth century, centering around three printed collections published in Augsburg and edited by Sigmund Salminger between 1540 and 1545. Salminger's collections contain a large repertory of motets by German and Franco-Flemish composers, most prominently featuring works by Ludwig Senfl, Josquin des Prez, Benedictus Appenzeller, and Adrian Willaert. Although the importance of these anthologies as sources of much otherwise unknown music has long been appreciated, musicologists have often characterized Salminger as a careless editor, irresponsibly making changes to the repertoire that he published. This study examines Salminger's editorial work in greater detail, arguing that his transformations of earlier models were in fact carefully conceived and carried out.;Chapter One of this study offers a detailed historical context for Salminger's career, placing it within the context of Augsburg's Reformation-era theological controversies and its thriving culture of printing; it also offers a new reading of Salminger's famously perplexing biography, since before becoming a music editor he was the leader of Augsburg's Anabaptist group, whose radical religious agenda ultimately landed him in prison. Chapter Two traces the sources of Salminger's repertoire, demonstrating that he had access to reliable sources of music from a wide array of European musical institutions, particularly those connected to the Low Countries and to the imperial chapel. Chapter Three argues that Salminger's desire for civic concord among Augsburg's religiously divided citizens motivated his editorial practice, and that his selection of repertoire in the earliest of his three printed collections reflects a conciliatory theological agenda, specifically influenced by the writings of Desiderius Erasmus.;Chapter Four presents case studies of transformations involving a single text, the biblical lament of King David for his son Absalom, previously thought to be simply an elegy for a dead son; I demonstrate instead that the text actually served as a Reformation-era polemic. Chapter Five examines motets that are musically altered or recomposed versions of an older model, concluding that despite their derivative status these works could function independently on their own.