The leading Italian composer in the period between Josquin and Palestrina, Costanzo Festa, probably a native of Florence, was in the service of the French court and at some time, perhaps earlier, of the Duchess of Francavilla. By 1517 he was a member of the papal choir under the Medici Pope Leo X, continuing under his successors, and greatly respected in Rome as a most excellent musician.

Church Music

Festa composed a small number of Mass settings, some Magnificats and Lamentations, and a larger quantity of motets. These include early works lamenting the deaths of Anne of Brittany and then of her husband Louis XII of France, and motets that seem to refer to and deplore the sack of Rome by the Imperial armies in 1527.

Madrigals

Festa’s madrigals circulated widely and are found in various published collections of the time.