Farmer, John

views updated

Farmer, John

Farmer, John, English organist and composer; b. c. 1570; d. after 1601. He was organist and Master of the Children at Christ Church Cathedral in Dublin in 1595, where he was made vicar-choral in 1596. In 1599 he went to London. He publ. Divers and Sundry Waies of Two Parts in One, to the number ofFortie, uppon One Playn Song (London, 1591) and The first Set of English Madrigals: To Foure Voices (London, 1599; ed. by E. Fellowes, The English Madrigal School VIII, 1914), which includes the celebrated madrigal Faire Phyllis I saw sitting all alone. He contributed canticles and hymns to Thomas East’s The Whole Booke of Psalmes (1592) and a madrigal to The Triumphes of Oriana (1603).

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire

More From encyclopedia.com