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ORLANDO GIBBONS (1583-1625) Born into a very musical family in Oxford (his father, three brothers, and his son were all musicians), Gibbons was brought up in Cambridge, where he entered the choir of King’s College in 1596 and took his MusB degree ten years later. He was appointed Organist of the Chapel Royal (which in those days was a body of people, not a building) in 1604, and Chamber Musician to King James I in 1619. Oxford University gave him a DMus in 1622, and the following year he became Organist of Westminster Abbey. He was taken ill and died suddenly in 1625 at Canterbury while waiting to officiate at the marriage of the new King, Charles I, for which he had composed some music.
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