Italian composer and violinist. He became a musician at St Mark's, Venice, in 1615, returning to Brescia in 1618 and then joining the court orchestra at Parma. From 1623 he spent periods in Germany serving the Duke of Neuburg and later in Dusseldorf, but from time to time revisited Italy. He finally returned there to work in Venice, Vicenza and Padua. He published many volumes of secular and instrumental music, laments, monodies and psalms; the instrumental chamber music is most important for its development of the sonata and dance suite forms, often with ostinato elements and prefatory slow sections. His Lagrime d'Erminia(1618) is a fine and moving example of the monodic lament.