Rovigo, Francesco, Franceschino, *1541 or 1542, †7 October 1597 Mantua, Italian organist and composer. In 1570 he was organist at the court of Duke Guglielmo Gonzaga, who sent him to Venice for further studies. In 1573 his hymns were performed in Mantua, but only in 1577 is his return to Gonzaga service firmly documented. From 1582 he served as organist in the chapel of Archduke Charles II in Graz. In 1590 he returned to Mantua, where he became organist at the Church of St. Barbara, and in 1591 also court composer to Vincenzo Gonzaga. Rovigo’s output, highly regarded by his contemporaries (as evidenced, among other things, by references to him in the correspondence of Claudio Monteverdi), includes both vocal – mostly for five voices: five masses, a Passion, about twenty madrigals (including those in his own collection Madrigali…, Book I, Venice 1581), and a three-voice canzona – and instrumental works (eight canzonas for four and eight voices and a toccata) that rank among his most original compositions.
Missa dominicalis in Sei missae dominicales, ed. S. Cisilino, Padua 1981
3 masses in The Gonzaga Masses in the Conservatory Library of Milan, Fondo Santa Barbara, vol.1: Masses of Guglielmo Gonzaga and Francesco Rovigo, ed. O. Beretta, «Corpus Mensurabilis Musicae» CVIII, Neuhausen 1997
1 madrigal, ed. I. Fenlon in Music and Patronage in Sixteenth-Century Mantua, vol. 2, Cambridge 1982
7 works in Francesco Rovigo et R. Trofeo. Canzoni da suonare a quattro, & a otto (Milan [1613?]), ed. J. Ladewig, «Italian Instrumental Music of the Sixteenth and Early Seventeenth Centuries» XXII, New York 1988
Canzona a 8, ed. R.G. Frieberger in: Italieniesche Canzonen und Motteten für 2 Orgeln/ Tasteninstrumente, Vienna 2009
