Alessandro Striggio

Alessandro Striggio (c. 1536/1537 – February 29, 1592) was an Italian composer, instrumentalist and diplomat of the Renaissance. He composed numerous madrigals as well as dramatic music, and by combining the two, became the inventor of madrigal comedy. His son, also named Alessandro Striggio, wrote the libretto for Monteverdi's Orfeo. Striggio senior was born in Mantua, evidently to an aristocratic family. Records of his early life are sparse, but he must have gone to Florence as a young man