(1516-1565)
Flemish composer, who like many of his nation spent much of his career in Italy as a composer of secular madrigals and sacred music. After study under Adriaan Willaert at Venice, where he was a singer at St. Mark's, he entered the service of Duke Ercole II of Ferrara about 1550. In 1561 he en-tered the service of Ottavio Farnese, duke of Parma. Rore spent 1563 as the successor to his teacher Willaert at Venice but returned to Parma in 1564. He is best known for his numerous madrigals, many of which are settings for poems by Petrarch. What made his madrigals most impressive was his sensitivity to the poetic rhetoric of the texts he was using.
Historical Dictionary of Renaissance. Charles G. Nauert. 2004.