Orlando Gibbons (bapt. 25 December 1583 – 5 June 1625) was an English composer and keyboard player who was one of the last masters of the English Virginalist School and English Madrigal School. The best known member of a musical family dynasty, by the 1610s he was the leading composer and organist in England, with a career cut short by his untimely death in 1625. As a result, Gibbons's oeuvre was not as large as that of his contemporaries, like the elder William Byrd, but he made considerable contributions to many genres of his time. Musicologists characterize his music as exemplifying the transition from the Renaissance to the Baroque periods.
Gibbons was born into a musical family where his father was a wait, his brothers—Edward, Ellis and Ferdinand—were musicians and Orlando was expected to follow the tradition. It is not known under whom he studied, although it may have been with Edward or Byrd, but he almost certainly studied the keyboard in his youth. Irrespective of his education, he was musically proficient enough to be appointed an unsalaried member of the Chapel Royal in May 1603 and a full-fledged gentleman of the Chapel Royal as junior organist by 1605. By 1606, he had graduated from King's College, Cambridge, with a Bachelor of Music degree.
Throughout his professional career, Gibbons maintained good relations with many important people of the English court. King James I and Prince Charles were supportive patrons and others, such as Sir Christopher Hatton, even became close friends. Along with Byrd and John Bull, Gibbons was the youngest contributor to the first printed collection of English keyboard music, Parthenia, and published other compositions in his lifetime, notably, the First Set of Madrigals and Motets (1612) which includes the best known English madrigal: The Silver Swan. Other important compositions include "This is the Record of John", the eight-part full anthem "O Clap Your Hands Together" and two settings of Evensong. The most important position achieved by Gibbons was his appointment in 1623 as the organist at Westminster Abbey, which he held for two years until his death.
Gibbons developed Byrd's foundations of the English madrigal, full and verse anthems, and by doing so he exerted significant influence on subsequent English composers. This generation included his oldest son Christopher, who would teach John Blow, Pelham Humfrey and Henry Purcell, the English pioneer of the Baroque era. After his death he was primarily remembered a composer of sacred music. Since the early music revival however, increased attention has come to his other compositions, with his keyboard works championed by Glenn Gould, while his madrigals and viol fantasies are popular among early music ensembles. By the 21st-century almost all of his music has been published and recorded.
Orlando Gibbons was born in Oxford. Until the early 20th century, he was believed to have been born in Cambridge. This was accepted as fact by his contemporaries, stated in multiple early biographies and even recorded on his memorial monument in Canterbury Cathedral, erected soon after his death. It is even possible that Gibbons himself thought that he was born in Cambridge, since he spent most of his life there and only the first four to five years of his life in Oxford. Matters are made more confusing as his father had lived in Cambridge for at least ten years before the birth of Gibbons. Therefore, even though 17th-century biographer Anthony Wood discovered a record of an "Orlando Gibbons" being baptised in St Martin's Church, Oxford, it was assumed that Gibbons was born in Cambridge but baptized in Oxford. Modern historians have proved the claim that he was born in Cambridge to be incorrect. Not only was the baptismal record shown to be authentic, but it was discovered that Orlando's parents both resided in Oxford at the time of his birth, confirming that Orlando was born in Oxford and baptized at St. Martin's, Oxford.
The Gibbons family can be traced back to Richard Gibbons (d. 1577), who was a glover active in Oxford; by 1549/50 he became a hanaster. Richard's son William was probably born in 1540 and at some point married Mary, whose maiden name is unknown. By 1567, William became wait at Cambridge by 1567. From 1580 to 1588 he lived in Oxford, where he was a city councillor and head of the town waits there.
While in Oxford, William and Mary had Orlando as probably the seventh of nine surviving children. There is no surviving record of the date of his birth, but he is recorded as being baptised at St. Martin's on Christmas Day 1583. It would be consistent with the normal practice of the time that Gibbons was born no more than a week before his baptism. Gibbons's father had previously lived in Cambridge where he was also the head of the town waits and around 1588, when Orlando was four or five years old, the Gibbons family moved back to Cambridge and William resumed his previous post there.
Orlando was born into a musical family: not only was his father a musician, but his oldest brother, Edward, was a composer and master of the Choir of King's College, Cambridge. His second brother, Ellis, was a promising composer but died prematurely, and his third brother, Ferdinando, eventually took their father's place as a wait. Not much else is known about Orlando Gibbons's youth, but being born into a musical family he was almost certainly instructed on a keyboard instrument and perhaps the viol. At the age of 12, he became a member of Edward's Choir of King's on 14 February 1596. He was a regular member of the choir until some time in the Michaelmas term of 1598. In the Easter term (summer term) of the same year he enrolled at King's College, Cambridge as a sizar, meaning he paid reduced fees but had to do various menial tasks. From 1598–99 Gibbons's name appeared sporadically in the chorus member logs, suggesting that, if not a clerical error, he continued to sing from time to time, perhaps for special occasions.
Gibbons's composition teacher is also unknown. It is possible he continued study with Edward, though there is no record of this. Another possible composition teacher is William Byrd, who was at least 40 years his senior and the most respected English composer at the time. Gibbons and Byrd along with the composer John Bull later collectively published music and since Bull was a student of Byrd's, Gibbons may very well also have been. Regardless of how his musical education came about, Gibbons was known to be composing music by the end of his time at the choir in 1599, aged 15–16. There is nothing known of Gibbons from then until 1603.
Gibbons's abilities had reached the point to allow him become a musician of the Chapel Royal by at least 19 May 1603. The Chapel Royal was a sizable group of priests and musicians who attended to the Monarch and royal household and Gibbons name appears at this time in a cheque book of the Chapel. Gibbons was a Gentleman Extraordinary (unpaid substitute) awaiting the vacancy of a paid position. Earlier that year King James I had ascended to the throne; in all likelihood Gibbons took part in the hymns and anthems of the 25 July coronation. 1603 was a year of mixed fortunes: he received his first position as a professional musician, but in the same year both his mother and his brother Ellis died. The plague may have been what his brother Ellis succumbed to. Eventually, Gibbons's awaited vacancy occurred with the death of Arthur Cook in January 1605, and on 21 March 1605 he secured the prestigious position of Gentleman of the Chapel Royal, as the junior chapel organist. Edward Gibbons's friendship with the former organist, Arthur Cook, and the senior chapel organist, John Bull, may have helped his younger brother secure this position. Gibbons kept the position until the end of his life.
In 1606, Gibbons married Elizabeth Patten on 17 February. Her father, John Patten, was a yeoman of the vestry in the Chapel Royal, and probably well acquainted with Gibbons, which would have helped to bring about the marriage. When John Patten died in 1623, he made Gibbons his sole heir, residuary legatee and left 200 pounds for his children. Later in 1606, Orlando graduated from Cambridge with the degree of Bachelor in Music. Gibbons and his wife lived in Woolstaple (now Bridge Street), which was in the parish of St Margaret's, Westminster, the church where Gibbons's seven children—James, Alice, Christopher, Ann, Mary, Elizabeth and Orlando—would be baptised.