Ban, Joan Albert

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Ban, Joan Albert

Ban, Joan Albert, Dutch music theorist and composer; b. Haarlem, 1597 or 1598; d. there, July 27, 1644. He was autodidact as a musician. He was active as a priest in Haarlem, where he was made a canon in 1628. He is historically important for his system of musica flexanima (zielroerende zang or soul-moving singing) in which the text of a score was delineated in musical terms by specific intervals, rhythms, and harmonies; he also worked on the problem of tuning.

Works

Zanh-bloemzel van loan Albert Ban...dat is, Staeltjes van den zinroerende zangh (Amsterdam, 1642).

Writings

Joannis Alberti Banni dissertatio epistolica de musicae natura, origine, progressu (Leiden, 1637); Cort beduydsel vant zingen (MS, 1642); Kort sang-bericht van loan Albert Ban...op zyne ziel- merende zangen (Amsterdam, 1643); Zangh-bericht (unfinished; not extant).

—Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire