FRESCOBALDI, Girolamo, a celebrated musical composer, was born at Ferrara in 1587. Little is known of his life except that he studied music at his birthplace under Alessandro Milleville, and owed his first reputation to his beautiful voice. According to one account he went to Belgium, at that time still a centre of the art, where he is said to have lived till 1608, after which period he appears to have settled in Italy, at first in Milan, and from 1627 in Rome, where three years later he obtained the office of organist of St Peter’s Cathedral. At this period he had acquired great fame as a virtuoso on the organ, and according to Baini no less than 30,000 people flocked to St Peter’s on his first appearance there. He also excelled as a teacher, Frohberger, the celebrated German organist and precursor of Bach, being the most distinguished of his pupils. Frescobaldi⅛ compositions show the consummate art of the early Italian school, and his works for the organ more especially are full of the finest devices of fugal treatment. He also wrote numerous vocal compositions, such as canzone, motets, hymns, &c., a collection of madrigals for five voices (Antwerp, 1608) being among the earliest of his published works. The year of his death is not sufficiently established. Fétis conjectures 1654.