William Brade
William Brade (1560 – 26 February 1630) was an English composer, violinist, and viol player of the late Renaissance and early Baroque eras, mainly active in northern Germany. He was the first Englishman to write a canzona, an Italian form, and probably the first to write a piece for solo violin.
Biography
Little is known about his early life. Around 1590 he left England to pursue a musical career in Germany, as did several other prominent English musicians, sensing better job opportunities abroad. He switched employments often between the various courts in north Germany and Denmark. Between his arrival in Germany, sometime around 1590, and 1594 he worked for the
However, in spite of the warning by his former employer, by 1613 he was working in Hamburg. Two years later—he liked to swap jobs every two years—he returned to Copenhagen, but in 1618 he moved on to
His last years were spent in Hamburg, one of the few refuges available within Germany from the ravages of the Thirty Years' War. There is no evidence that he ever returned to England.
Compositions
All of Brade's surviving music is for string instruments, and most is for dancing. The earlier music, for example, in his collection published in 1609 in Hamburg, is based on English models, and similar to the contemporary work of composers such as
His
Stylistically, his music is more homophonic than much of the music by his English contemporaries, who still preferred a polyphonic idiom.
As a performer, he was famous for his fine technique; he was one of the most famous early violinists, and highly regarded in Germany. Several pieces by other composers were published in Hamburg as tributes to him after his death.
References
- Grove, George; Sadie, Stanley (1980). "William Brade". The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. London: Macmillan Publishers. ISBN 1-56159-174-2.