JOHN MUNDY
(1550 - 1630)

Page last updated 2005-02-11

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The particular madrigal(s) here below have the music written by Mundy but the words to the first song, "My Prime Of Youth" are an
auto-epitath written the night before his execution (Sept. 20, 1586 at  the age of 28) by one CHIDIOCK TICHBORNE, a member of
the so-called "Babington Plot" to remove Elizabeth I by regicide and replace her with Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots. Needless to say, the
plots failed, thanks to Sir Francis Walsingham, and the plotters were arrested, tried and executed and there the matter should have lain
except for the unusual beauty of this poem, sent to his wife by Tichborne.

John Mundy set it to music around 1592 (presumably after all the feathers had been smoothed back into place - even so, a daring thing
to do when dealing with such a notoriously capricious monarch as Elizabeth!) and at some later time another of his madrigals was
attached to the former, presumably to make a longer performance.

In light of the method of Tichborne's execution  (hanged, taken down and disembowled while still alive; lacking only "quartering"  to
complete the ancient punishment for treason) one cannot think but that the two halves were never intended by the composer to be sung
together, still....


My Prime Of Youth (wds. Chidiock Tichborne)      :: NWC :: MIDI :: PDF ::

In Deep Distress                                                           :: NWC :: MIDI :: PDF ::

both songs as one                                                          :: NWC :: MIDI :: PDF ::
If you wish to contribute a Madrigal for the John MUNDY (or any other) page,
please email it to me as an attachment in PDF form, as a .gif or jpeg of the sheet
music or as an NWC file. (V 1.75, please!)  All contributions gratefully received.

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Other pages you may find to be of interest:

Frayed Knot Arts (which helps support these pages)

Catches, Rounds and Glees
O'Neills Music Of Ireland (The 1850)
O'Carolan's Complete Compositions

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