HENRY LAWES: CAVALIER SONGWRITER

First edition. Hardcover. Publisher's original navy blue cloth with gilt titles to the spine, in dustwrapper. A very near fine copy, the binding square and tight, bright and fresh. The contents, with a faint brown mark to the blank front endpaper, are otherwise clean throughout and without inscriptions or stamps. Complete with the fine original dustwrapper that is without fading, loss or tears.

Issued in the 'Oxford Monographs on Music' series. Henry Lawes (1596-1662) has long been acknowledged as the most important and prolific English songwriter between the death of John Dowland in 1626 and the birth of Henry Purcell in 1659. He is celebrated as Milton's collaborator in Comus (1634). Although he wrote some church music, Lawes's significance as a composer lies in his settings of many of the choicest lyrics by Cavalier poets such as Carew, Herrick, Suckling, and Waller, who, like Lawes himself, belonged to the brilliant court of Charles I. This book combines an account of his life with a study of his development as a songwriter during this fascinating period. Following the execution of the King in 1649, Lawes played an important part in establishing concerts in London during the 1650s, and was one of the composers of the first English opera, Davenant's The Siege of Rhodes (1656).