Alessandro Striggio

The Italian composer Alessandro Striggio wrote numerous madrigals as well as dramatic music. By combining the two genres, he became the inventor of the madrigal comedy.
Striggio was born in Mantua. Records of his early life are sparse, but he must have gone to Florence as a young man. He began working for Cosimo de' Medici on 1 March 1559 as a musician. During the 1580s he began an association with the Este court in Ferrara and composed music in the progressive style he heard there, which unfortunately is lost. In 1586 he moved to Mantua, where he remained for the rest of his life.
Striggio wrote both sacred and secular vocal music, sometimes with instrumental accompaniment. He was very influential in his lifetime, as shown by the distribution of his music through Europe in the late 16th century. One of his most impressive works is his motet Ecce beatam lucem for 40 independent voices. Of an even larger scale is the Missa sopra Ecco sì beato giorno with an Agnus Dei for 60 voices. This work was long thought to be lost, but was recently discovered by the American musicologist Davitt Moroney.