Edward Johnson ( fl. 1572–1601) was an English composer. Johnson's compositions were highly regarded in his time, but few of them survive.

Life

Johnson was born about 1549.According to a 1601 deposition in which he gave his age as about fifty-two. See Ian Harwood, ‘Johnson, Edward (b. c.1549, d. in or after 1602)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 200
accessed 2 July 2014
(subscription required) He composed pieces for members of the Elizabethan aristocracy, and had a long association with the Kitson family, who had houses in London and

Hengrave Hengrave is a small village and civil parish in the West Suffolk district, in the county of Suffolk, England. It is to the North the town of Bury St Edmunds along the A1101 road. It is surrounded by the parishes of Flempton, Culford, Fornham S ...

, Suffolk. Sir Thomas Kitson (1540-1603) and his wife

Elizabeth Kitson Elizabeth, Lady K(i, y)tson born Lady Elizabeth Cornwallis (1546/7 – 2 August 1628) was an English music patron. She lived and managed Hengrave Hall in Suffolk where she and her husband employed personal musicians and created a music collection. ...

also employed the composer

John Wilbye John Wilbye (baptized 7 March 1574September 1638) was an English madrigal composer. Early life and education The son of a tanner, he was born at Brome, Suffolk, England. (Brome is near Diss.) Career Wilbye received the patronage of the Cornwa ...

from the 1590s. Johnson obtained a Mus. Bac. degree in 1594 from

Caius College Gonville and Caius College, often referred to simply as Caius ( ), is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1348, it is the fourth-oldest of the University of Cambridge's 31 colleges and one of t ...

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

. He appears in documentary records relating to the beginning of the seventeenth century. With John Wilbye he corrected the proofs of Dowland´s ''Second Book of Songs'', which was published in London in 1600. He was also mentioned in connection with arrangements for the funeral of his patron Sir Thomas Kitson, an event which took place in Hengrave in 1603. It is not known what happened to him subsequently.Ian Harwood, ‘Johnson, Edward (b. c.1549, d. in or after 1602)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 200
accessed 2 July 2014
(subscription required)

Works

Perhaps his best-known work is "Eliza Is the Fairest Queen" (a tribute to Elizabeth I). Other works include: * "Come, blessed bird":

madrigal A madrigal is a form of secular vocal music most typical of the Renaissance (15th–16th c.) and early Baroque (1600–1750) periods, although revisited by some later European composers. The polyphonic madrigal is unaccompanied, and the number o ...

for six voices (SSAATB) from ''

The Triumphs of Oriana ''The Triumphs of Oriana'' is a book of English madrigals, compiled and published in 1601 by Thomas Morley, which first edition has 25 pieces by 23 composers (Thomas Morley and Ellis Gibbons have two madrigals). It was said to have been made to ...

'' * "Jhonsons Medley" (

Fitzwilliam Virginal Book The ''Fitzwilliam Virginal Book'' is a primary source of keyboard music from the late Elizabethan and early Jacobean periods in England, i.e., the late Renaissance and very early Baroque. It takes its name from Viscount Fitzwilliam who beque ...

).Keith Johnson, Rovi.
Edward Johnson (16th c.-fl. 1572-1601); ENG, About/Bio
, classicalarchives.com. Retrieved 10 September 2011.

References

External links

* English classical composers English madrigal composers Renaissance composers 16th-century English composers Year of birth unknown Year of death unknown English male classical composers Alumni of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge {{composer-stub