Paul Hofhaimer

Born in 1459 places Paul Hofhaimer close to the generation of Heinrich Fink and Josquin Desprez. His surviving work is quite meager . . . it seems his reputation rested more on his organ playing and improvising, first noted in the chapel of Sigismund of Tyrol in Innsbruck, where he became known to Maximilian, son of the Emperor, Friedrich III. Hofhaimer was already Court Organist to Maximilian I when when he was elected Emperor in 1493. In the woodcut of Maximilian’s Triumphal Procession, Hofhaimer is pictured sitting at the organ on a horse-drawn cart . . . rather indicative of the life of an Imperial musician required to travel between the Courts of the Empire.
Later in life when he had become organist at Salzburg Cathedral he wrote “I thank God that I no longer have to travel around like a gypsy”. He died there in 1537.