Claudio Monteverdi
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Son of Baldassarre Monteverdi and Maddalena Zignani, Claudio Monteverdi was born in Cremona, Italy, on May 15th, 1567 (Towards the end of the Renaissance period and lived on in the baroque period). Monteverdi was a boy chorister at the Cremona Cathedral, where he studied music with Marc' Antonio Ingegneri, and published his volume of three-voice motets as a teen. He issued a volume of three-part canzonettas and his first three volumes of madrigals from 1587 to 1592. In 1590, Monteverdi became a viola player and a madrigal singer at the court of Vincenzo Gonzaga, the duke of Mantua. When the duke passed away, at 34 Monteverdi had become Maestro di Cappella at St. Mark's Cathedral in Venice. It wasn't until 1595 when he traveled to Vienna, Prague and took part in a campaign to fight against the Turks, where he married Claudia Cattaneo, a singer at the court. Between the years 1603 and 1605, Monteverdi had issues two more volumes of Madrigals but in 1607 his wife's untimely death left him with two infant sons. A couple months after his wife's death, he issues another volume of three-voice Scherzi and his first opera, "La Favola d'Orfeo." A year later he completed a second opera, "Adriana," of which only a single fragment had survived...