Alfonso Ferrabosco the younger
English composer and viol player (c. 1575–1628)
Alfonso Ferrabosco the younger (c. 1575 – March 1628) was an English composer and viol player of Italian descent. He straddles the line between the Renaissance and Baroque eras.
Biography
Ferrabosco was born at Greenwich, the illegitimate son of the Italian composer Alfonso Ferrabosco the elder. His mother might have been Susanna Symons, whom Alfonso the elder later married. Ferrabosco the younger was left under the guardianship of Gomer van Awsterwyke, a member of Queen Elizabeth I's court. Although Alfonso the elder asked for Alfonso the younger to be sent to him in Italy, where he had moved with his wife, the Queen insisted that he stay in England. Ferrabosco remained in Gomer van Awsterwyke's care until Awsterwyke's death in 1592. At this time he started a long career as a court musician.
After the Union of the Crowns he became the private music tutor of Prince Henry and a groom of privy chamber, with a salary of £50.
The public source identifies “Alfonso Ferrabosco the younger” as english composer and viol player (c. 1575–1628). This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Alfonso, Ferrabosco and younger.
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Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 11, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q726038. VIAF identifies the subject as 24787049. The Library of Congress control number is n82139117. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1575, 1628 and 1592.
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This entry incorporates text from “Alfonso Ferrabosco the younger” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.