Jean Mouton -also: Jean de Holloigue, Houllievigues; Motonis, Moto, Moton, Muton, Moutonac- (c.1459 - 30/10/1522), a French composer, from the dept. of Somme. He was a pupil of Josquin, teacher of Willaert. There is much unsure about the live of Jean Mouton. In 1502 he became a musician in the Hofkapelle of Louis XII and in 1510 his maître till he died in 1522. His oeuvre: 25 songs, 9 Magnificats, 15 masses and some 100 motetten.

Jean Mouton (real name Jean de Holluigue) was one of the most important motet South-Netherlandish composers of the mid Renaissance period. He was born near Holluigue nowadays Haut-Wignes about 1459. This area where he was born belonged to the Dukes of Burgundy. Nearly nothing is known about his youth and his musical education.
At the age of 18 or some older, Mouton was appointed as chorister and also appointed as a teacher of the choirboys in the church of Notre Dame in Nesle in 1477 in Picardie. In 1483 he achieved the position of maître de la chappelle/Maestro di cappella (cantor) there. Mouton was ordinated priest. In 1494-1495 Mouton worked as a singer in the cathedral of St. Omer. By 1500 Mouton worked in Amiens and in Grenoble for a short term before he served the French royal court under Queen Anne of Brittany (1477-1514) as magister capellae, and after her death as maestro di cappella under Louis XII (1462-1515) and Francis I (1494-1547). Furthermore Mouton was appointed canon - in absentia - at St. André in Grenoble and was appointed canon in his last years in St. Quentin where he died and was buried, which belongs too to the Dukes of Burgundy. In between Mouton had too a benefices in Thérouanne.
Mouton wrote both secular and sacred music for specific public and private royal functions, including royal weddings. The fame of Mouton was widely spread, and he was among the first composers to have an entire volume of his music published. This was done by the pioneer of music printing the Italian, Ottaviano dei Petrucci (1466-1539), who issued a book of his Masses in 1515. A large volume of his works survived, numbering over 100 motets, 15 masses, and more than 20 chansons. Another legacy of the fame of Mouton, having been the teacher of Adriaen Willaert (c.1488/90-1562), who became a famous composer of the South-Netherlandish style. Willaert generated great influence in Italian music of the high Renaissance in Venice with the remarkable Venetian choir-style, coro spezzati and was founder of the famous Venetian School.
Mouton tended to write calming, meditative music with smooth, flowing polyphony that means a continuous flow of vocal lines from beginning up to the end, with imitating of melodic lines in each voice in a counterpoint. As example we mention the splendid “Nesciens Mater “ set for eight voices. All compositions by Mouton are set in a modest way of developing and paving the way the music of the South-Netherlandish generations to follow. Although Mouton lived and worked in which we call today France he belongs in our opinion to the third generation of South-Netherlandish Renaissance composers, a very large number of craftsmen with enormous skills in Polyphonic writing spread all over Europe.