Costanzo festa biography of michael

​FESTA, Costanzo, one of the earliest composers of the Roman school, was born somewhere towards the close of the 15th century. He was elected a member of the Pontifical choir in 1517, and died April 10, 1545.

He eventually became Maestro at the Vatican, and his nomination was so far singular that he was at that time the only Italian in a similar position throughout the Peninsula. His genius cannot be doubted, and Dr. Burney, who had been at the trouble of scoring a great number of his Madrigals, was astonished at the rhythm, grace, and facility of them.

The Doctor calls one of Festa's Motetti, 'Quam pulchra es, anima mea,' a model of elegance, simplicity, and pure harmony, and says that 'the subjects of imitation in it are as modern, and that the parts sing as well, as if it were a production of the eighteenth century.' Festa, according to Baini, fell in his motets into a fashion too prevalent in his day, of setting distin