William Young (died 23 April 1662) was an English
viol
The viol (), viola da gamba (), or informally gamba, is any one of a family of bowed, fretted, and stringed instruments with hollow wooden bodies and pegboxes where the tension on the strings can be increased or decreased to adjust the pitc ...
player and composer of the
Baroque
The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...
era, who worked at the court of
Ferdinand Charles, Archduke of Austria in
Innsbruck
Innsbruck (; bar, Innschbruck, label=Bavarian language, Austro-Bavarian ) is the capital of Tyrol (state), Tyrol and the List of cities and towns in Austria, fifth-largest city in Austria. On the Inn (river), River Inn, at its junction with the ...
. The
sonata
Sonata (; Italian: , pl. ''sonate''; from Latin and Italian: ''sonare'' rchaic Italian; replaced in the modern language by ''suonare'' "to sound"), in music, literally means a piece ''played'' as opposed to a cantata (Latin and Italian ''cant ...
s which he published in 1653 were some of the earliest sonatas produced by an English composer.
Biography
The details of Young's origins are unknown. By 1652 he was a chamber musician at the Innsbruck court, where "the Englishman", as he was called, was a highly regarded viol player and composer. The design of his English-made viol influenced that of some of the viols built by
Jakob Stainer, the Austrian
luthier
A luthier ( ; AmE also ) is a craftsperson who builds or repairs string instruments that have a neck and a sound box. The word "luthier" is originally French and comes from the French word for lute. The term was originally used for makers o ...
. In 1660 Ferdinand Charles granted permission for Young to visit England, but there are no traces of his reappearance there. He is not to be confused with William Young (died 1671), another musician, who played
violin
The violin, sometimes known as a ''fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone (string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular ...
and
flute
The flute is a family of classical music instrument in the woodwind group. Like all woodwinds, flutes are aerophones, meaning they make sound by vibrating a column of air. However, unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is a reedless ...
at the court of
Charles II of England
Charles II (29 May 1630 – 6 February 1685) was King of Scotland from 1649 until 1651, and King of England, Scotland and Ireland from the 1660 Restoration of the monarchy until his death in 1685.
Charles II was the eldest surviving child of ...
from 1661.
Young died on 23 April 1662 and was buried at Innsbruck's parish church, St Jakob, which has since become
Innsbruck Cathedral
Innsbruck Cathedral, also known as the Cathedral of St. James (german: Dom zu St. Jakob), is an eighteenth-century Baroque cathedral of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Innsbruck in the city of Innsbruck, Austria, dedicated to the apostle Saint Jam ...
.
Works
Young and
Henry Butler
Henry Butler (September 21, 1948 – July 2, 2018) was an American jazz and blues pianist. He learned piano, drums, and saxophone in school. He received a college degree and graduate degree and taught at the New Orleans Center for Creative ...
, an English viol player working at the Spanish court, were the first English composers to call their works sonatas. However, Butler died in 1652 with his three sonatas unpublished. Young's 11 sonatas for two, three, and four parts and
continuo, published in Innsbruck in 1653, are known to have reached England. In modern times, the 11 sonatas were rediscovered by
William Gillies Whittaker
William Gillies Whittaker (Newcastle upon Tyne, July 23, 1876 – Orkney Islands, July 5, 1944) was an English composer, pedagogue, conductor, musicologist, Bach scholar, publisher and writer. He spent his life promoting music. The University ...
. He found them in manuscript in
Uppsala University Library
The Uppsala University Library ( sv, Uppsala universitetsbibliotek) at Uppsala University in Uppsala, Sweden, consists of 11 subject libraries, one of which is housed in the old main library building, Carolina Rediviva. The library holds books an ...
in Sweden, and published them in 1930.
[Schaffer(1977), p. 511]
Notes
References
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External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Young, William
Year of birth uncertain
1662 deaths
English classical composers
English Baroque composers
English viol players
17th-century English composers
17th-century classical composers
Composers from Innsbruck
English male classical composers
Musicians from Innsbruck
17th-century male musicians