CLEMENTS, Jacob, called Non Papa. — Musician, b. in Flanders toward the end of the 15th century or at the beginning of the 16th, d. at Dixmuiden in 1555. He was called Non Papa to distinguish him from a contemporary, the poet Jacobus Papa who lived at Ypres where C. J. stayed for some time.
He composed many works of sacred music in which he proved himself a worthy continuer of the glorious tradition of Josquin Després and a forerunner of the great Palestrinian art: works of clear, harmonious, pure style, which reveal a powerful expressiveness in the counterpoint of the voices and in the thematic elaboration of the melodies. These include many masses for 4–5–6 voices, printed in 10 volumes at Louvain by Phalese from 1558 to 1560; Cantionum sacrarum for 4 voices; motets in various collections of the time, up to works reprinted in modern collections (Commer and Maldeghem) and recent ones (a 5-voice motet O Maria, edited by H. B. Collins at Chester in 1933). Numerous manuscripts are found in various libraries of Europe: Berlin, Basel, Dresden, Kassel, London (British Museum), Leiden, Regensburg, Cambridge, Wolfenbüttel, Lübeck, Bruges, Vienna, etc., as well as in Rome (Sistine Chapel and S. Cecilia).