John Wilbye

John Wilbye (1574-1638) was one of the most accomplished composers of English madrigals at the end of the Renaissance. Employed as a musician at Hengrave, the estate of Thomas Kytson, Wilbye was urged to provide vocal music for up to as many as six parts, and these were collected in The First Set of English Madrigals, published in 1598. A second set followed 10 years later. Wilbye's music is regarded as the epitome of madrigal writing, though it appears as well to be the final flowering of this form, for shortly after his death it fell out of fashion.