MASTER LIST OF COMPOSERS

Below is a list of composers currently represented on this Web site. Clicking on a composer's name will bring up a list of madrigals available to be downloaded. Three downloads are available for each madrigal: Score (in PDF format), MIDI (.mid) and Text/Translation (also in PDF).

All downloads are free of charge; however, you must register with the site in order to download Scores and Texts/Translations.

Note that, in the case of madrigals in multiple sections, the full Text/Translation may be downloaded from the entry for the first section (the prima parte).

NOTE ABOUT MIDI FILES: Mac users are advised that Apple's QuickTime application no longer supports MIDI. However, MIDI files can be played on GarageBand for Mac, as well as on some third-party freeware programs. Alternatively, users can request MP3 files of particular pieces by contacting Martin Morell.


Aleotti, Vittoria
Arcadelt, Jacques (Giaches)
Artusini, Antonio
Bati, Luca, Primo a 5 (1594) (complete)
Bellasio, Paolo
Bertani, Lelio
Boschetti, Giovanni Boschetto
Caletti, Giovanni Battista
Califano, Giovanni Battista
Capilupi, Gemignano
Casentini, Marsilio
Cavaccio, Giovanni
Cifra, Antonio
Costa, Gasparo
Croce, Giovanni
D'India, Sigismondo
Dalla Casa, Girolamo
Del Mel, Rinaldo
Dentice, Fabrizio
Falcone, Achille
Felis, Stefano
Florio, Giorgio
Freddi, Amadio
Gabrieli, Giovanni
Gagliano, Marco da
Gastoldi, Concenti musicali a8 (1604/1610) (complete)
Gastoldi, Giovanni Giacomo
Gastoldi, Primo a 6 (1592) (complete)
Gastoldi, Quarto a 5 (1602) (complete)
Ghizzolo, Giovanni
Giovanelli, Ruggiero
Guami, Francesco
Guerini, Pietro Francesco
Ingegneri, MarcAntonio
Isnardi, Paolo
Leoni, Leone
Mancini, Curzio
Marenzio, Luca
Masnelli, Paolo
Massaino, Primo a 6 (1604) (complete)
Massaino, Quarto a 5 (1594) (complete)
Massaino, Terzo a 5 (1587) (complete)
Mezzogorri, Giovanni Nicolò
Monteverdi, Claudio
Mosto, Giovanni Battista
Nasco, Giovan (Jan)
Nodari, Giovanni Paolo, Madrigali a 5 (complete)
Pallavicino, Benedetto
Rognoni Taeggio, Francesco, Primo a 5 (1613) (complete)
Rognoni Taeggio, Giovanni Domenico, Primo a 5 (1605) (complete)
Rore, Cipriano (De)
Rossetti, Stefano
Rossi, Salamone
Ruffolo, Lucrezio
Sabino, Ippolito
Santini, Marsilio
Stabile, Annibale
Taroni, Antonio
Tomasi, Biagio
Tresti, Flaminio
Tresti, Secondo a 5 (1587) (complete)
Usper (Spongia), Francesco
Valmarana, Girolamo
Various (from Dolci Affetti, 1582)
Various (from Trionfo di Musica, 1579)
Vecchi, Orazio
Venturi del Nibbio, Primo a 5 (1592) (complete)
Venturi del Nibbio, Primo pastorali a 5 (1592) (complete)
Verdonck, Cornelius
Virchi, Paolo, Primo a 5 (1584) (complete)
Virchi, Paolo, Secondo a 5 (1588) (complete)
Wert, Decimo a 5 (1591) (complete)
Wert, Giaches de
Wert, Ottavo a 5 (1586) (complete)
Zanchi, Liberale
Zanotti, Camillo
Zoilo, Annibale

Marenzio, Luca

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Title and DescriptionScoreMidiTranslation
Scendi dal paradiso, Venere (prima parte of 2?) (SSATB)
A delightfully expressive madrigal clearly intended to commemorate a wedding. (Marenzio's Roman colleague Giovanni Andrea Dragoni published, almost simultaneously, an extended epithalamium for Placida Colonna and Lucio Savello, Baron of Rignano; just possibly, "Scendi dal paradiso" was composed for the same occasion.)		 Download
Corran di puro latte (seconda parte?) (SSATB)
Although not indicated as such, this piece may comprise a seconda parte of the preceding.		 Download
Rivi fontane e fiumi (SS A/T TB)
Marenzio at his most vivacious and exuberant. The piece is transposed down a fourth from the original; a version at the original pitch is also available.		 Download
Due rose fresche (prima parte of 2) (SSATB)
A beautifully crafted setting of a sonnet by Petrarch, describing an (evidently imaginary) encounter between the poet, his beloved, and a somewhat enigmatic wise old man.		 Download
Non vede un simil par d'amanti il sole (seconda parte) (SSATB)
 Download
Giunto alla tomba (prima parte of 4) (SATTB)
Marenzio's effort to out-do Wert (q.v.) in setting this dramatic and emotion-laden episode from Tasso's Gerusalemme Liberata.		 Download
Non di morte sei tu (seconda parte) (SATTB)
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Dagli lor tu (terza parte) (SATTB)
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Ed amando morrò (quarta parte) (SATTB)
 Download
Che fa oggi il mio sole (SSATB)
A light-hearted early madrigal by Marenzio, on a conventional pastoral theme.		 Download
Chi vuol veder amore (SSATB)
The protagonist flaunts his drop-dead-gorgeous girlfriend, Marenzio cleverly word-paints the references to Cupid's snares, bow and arrows.		 Download
Scaldava il sol (SSATB)
A representation of summertime in the country, complete with birds and cicadas. The text is taken from Luigi Alamanni's Favola di Narciso, a remake of the Ovidian tale of Narcissus and Echo. (Alamanni also authored works on agriculture and rustic life, which may account for the verisimilitude of the description.)		 Download
Tirsi morir volea (prima parte of 3) (SATTB)
An explicitly erotic madrigal -- the three parts depicting foreplay, consummation, and afterplay -- which enjoyed something of a succes de scandale. (See Alfred Einstein, The Italian Madrigal, Vol. 2, pp. 541-543, for a disparaging view of the text's popularity.) However, the work should not necessarily be treated as blatantly obscene or the musical equivalent of a dirty joke.		 Download
Frenò Tirsi il desio (seconda parte) (SATTB)
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Così moriro (terza parte) (SATTB)
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Donna bella e crudel (SS A/T TB)
Marenzio's earliest known madrigal, published in an anthology of 1577, three years in advance of his ground-breaking Primo libro a 5. The work displays considerable sophistication, as well as hints of developments to come. Only the Canto and Alto partbooks survive; James Chater has ably reconstructed the three missing parts and has obligingly made the piece available to this site.		 Download
Donò Cinzia a Damone (SSATTB)
Marenzio's charming setting of Guarini's equally charming pastoral vignette of blushing nymph and ardent shepherd.		 Download
Qual vive salamandra (SSATTB)
The text is an extended simile based on the notion, which goes back to classical antiquity, that salamanders could live and even thrive in fire. 		Download
Dice la mia bellissima Licori (SSATTB)
Marenzio's setting of the text that provided the model for Wilbye's "Thus saith my Cloris bright." (See also the versions by Dalla Casa and Vecchi.) Marenzio nicely incorporates contrasting passages a3 and a4 into the six-voice writing.		 Download
Quell'augellin, che canta (SATTB)
Marenzio's appealing rendition of Linco's exhortation to Silvio, to the effect that birds do it, bees do it, everyone but you does it (Pastor Fido I/i), follows the original text more closely than does Monteverdi's (q.v.), although Marenzio replaces the reference to Silvio with the less specific "Tirsi". 		Download
Cruda Amarilli (prima parte of 2) (SATTB)
Marenzio’s setting of the speech that introduces the woebegone protagonist Mirtillo of Pastor fido (I/ii) is typical of the somewhat restless, edgy style of his late works. In the seconda parte, he eschews the temptation to indulge in vocal fireworks on the words “Ma grideran per me le piagg’ e i monti,” and reserves the main surprise for the end, in the form of remarkable chromatic passages. 		Download
Ma grideran per me (seconda parte) (SATTB)
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Ombrose e care selve (SATTB)
Marenzio's setting of Ergasto's rapturous outburst, spoken to an uncomprehending Corisca (Pastor Fido, V/viii). For more details, see the Notes accompanying the text/translation, as well as the description of D'India's setting of the same text. The piece contains sections in triple meter, for which Marenzio uses two different signs: O3 and 3, evidently to denote different tempi. Although there seems to be no justification in contemporary theory for doing so, for the O3 section I have elected to put the minims in sesquialtera proportion relative to C, while for 3 I have doubled the pulse of the minim.		 Download
Se tu, dolce mio ben, mi saettasti (prima parte of 3) (SATTB)
Marenzio's setting represents an early attempt to render in music a dialogue (as opposed to a monologue or soliloquy) from Pastor Fido -- in this case between the gravely wounded Dorinda and the hunter Silvio, who has heretofore scorned her -- thus introducing a purposeful dramatic element into the madrigal idiom. Musically, however, the work relies heavily on a relentless homophonic texture and arioso-like writing, the effect of which is perhaps to offer less satisfaction to the listener than to the performer.		 Download
Dorinda, ah dirò mia (seconda parte) (SATTB)
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Ferir quel petto, Silvio? (terza parte) (SATTB)
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Ah, dolente partita (SATTB)
Marenzio's setting of Mirtillo's grief-laden farewell (Pastor Fido III/iii) was published a year before Wert's (q.v.). Both pieces highlight the agonized, despairing quality of the text, but employ differing musical means to do so. For yet another approach, see in particular Monteverdi's later setting.		 Download
Deh Tirsi, anima mia, perdona (prima parte of 2) (S MS ATB)
Marenzio's setting of Amarilli's wrenching soliloquy (Pastor Fido, III/iv), in which she laments the emotional harm that she is compelled to inflict on Mirtillo (whose name is here replaced by the more generic 'Tirsi'). The declamatory, arioso-like style is characteristic of his later madrigals. See also the setting by Monteverdi ("Anima mia, perdona").		 Download
Che, se tu sei ’l cor mio (seconda parte) (S MS ATB)
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Deh poich' era ne' fati (SATTB)
Marenzio's setting of a short section of Mirtillo's extended exchange with Ergasto, comprising Scene 2 of Act I of Il Pastor Fido, in which Mirtillo laments his greatly diminished expectations regarding his beloved Amarilli.		 Download
Baci soavi e cari (prima parte of 5) (SSATTB) *NEW*
Hedonism is a prominent textual theme of Marenzio's Quinto libro a 6, as James Chater has observed, and the extended setting of the poem known as the "canzon de' baci" is no exception. This paean to osculatory bliss is suffused with a strong dose of eroticism and sensuality. A number of other composers, including Costa, Masnelli and Monteverdi (q.v.), set the text of the prima parte, but Marenzio was one of only two bold enough to attempt the entire poem. (The other setting, by Girolamo Belli, does not survive complete.) A version transposed down a whole step is also available.		 Download
Baci amorosi e belli (seconda parte) (SSATTB) *NEW*
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Baci affamati e ingordi (terza parte) (SSATTB) *NEW*
 Download
Baci cortesi e grati (quarta parte) (SSATTB) *NEW*
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Baci ohimè non mirate (quinta ed ultima parte) (SSATTB) *NEW*
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Dolorosi martir, fieri tormenti (SATTB) *NEW*
In this early but ground-breaking work, perhaps Marenzio wished to demonstrate an adeptness at setting affective poetry -- here a depths-of-despair cri de coeur -- as well as an ability to surpass previous efforts, in particular Ingegneri's (q.v.). The piece was subsequently "Englished" and published in Musica Transalpina, the Second Book (London, 1597).		 Download
O fido o caro Aminta (SATTB) *NEW*
Marenzio -- the only composer known to have set this narratively problematic excerpt from Il Pastor Fido, I/ii -- employs both modal ambiguity and homophony to create an arresting and dramatically intense work. (His setting of "Deh poich' era ne' fati", above, is drawn from the same scene.)		 Download
Nel dolce seno della bella Clori (prima parte of 2) (SAATTB) *NEW*
The basic theme – a sexual encounter between two pastoral characters – has much in common with Guarini’s famous (or notorious) “Tirsi morir volea,” although a bit more verbal airbrushing is applied to the erotic acts, and the seconda parte adopts a rather morbid affect. The downward leap of a fourth or fifth in some parts at the name “Tirsi” is reminiscent of Marenzio’s similar treatment in his earlier setting of “Tirsi morir volea,” and the piece also displays some notable “eye-music” (on the word “occhi” in the prima parte and “… una dolc’ ombra Di morte” in the seconda, the phrase being set to black notes). 		Download
Perché l’una e l’altra alma (seconda parte) (SAATTB) *NEW*
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