When informed that “jealousy was the motive to it” Purcell lamented Stradella’s fate, and “in regret of his great merit as a musician”, said he could forgive him any injury in that kind.
~ From Purcell studies by Curtis Price
Roger North, 1651 – 1734; English lawyer and Biographer; King’s Council, 1682- 1685
Read more about him and the North family here.
Portrait of Roger North by Peter Lely
Portrait of Sir Francis North by Peter Lely
Roger North’s eldest brother:
Francis North, 1st Baron Guilford, 1637 – 1685; Keeper of the Great Seal 1683-1685
Henry Purcell, English Composer, 1659 – 1695, finest and most original composer of his day. Though he was to live a very short life he was able to enjoy and make full use of the renewed flowering of music after the Restoration of the Monarchy.
As the son of a musician at Court, a chorister at the Chapel Royal, and the holder of continuing royal appointments until his death, Purcell worked in Westminster for three different Kings over twenty-five years.
Carlo Ambrogio Lonati as an old man
Carlo Ambrogio Lonati, c.1645 – c.1712, Italian composer, violinist and singer, described as one of the most virtuoso violinists of his century. Friend of Alessandro Stradella
Nicola Matteis byGodfrey Kneller, 1682
Nicola Matteis fl. c. 1670 – after 1714, earliest notable Italian Baroque violinist in London, whom Roger North judged in retrospect “to have bin a second to Corelli,” and a composer of significant popularity in his time, though he has been utterly forgotten until the later 20th century.
Pietro Reggio, 1632 – 1685, Italian composer, lutenist, and singer, probably from Genoa, who settled in England after 1664 – I couldn’t find any images of him, but the diarist Samuel Pepys called him “slovenly and ugly”.
Celia Fiennes, English Traveler and author of Through England on a Side Saddle, 1663 – 1741
bardessdmdenton - author- artist 