Purcell called him “one of the greatest masters in the world.” Like Monteverde, he tried out new effects in harmony and made new combinations which have since been called “crude,” but were signs of a musical daring and understanding that belong only to very gifted musicians. He died in 1708 and is buried in Westminster Abbey. MAISTER PURCELL The last of the great 17th century English composers, and the greatest of them all, is Henry Purcell (1658–1695). His father was a well-known musician, and the uncle, who brought him up, was also a musician, so the young boy heard much music in his own home, and no doubt knew many composers. Sir Frederick Bridge in _Twelve Good Musicians_ tells us that the Purcell family came from Tipperary in Ireland and that Henry’s father and uncle were Gentlemen in the Chapel Royal in London. Henry began his music studies at the age of six, for he, too, was one of “Captain Cooke’s boys,” and when he was twelve years old, “Maister Purcell” wrote a composition in honor of “His Majestie’s Birthday.” The young Purcell, sometimes called the “English Mozart,” gained much from Pelham Humphrey who told him of Lully in France. After Humphrey’s early death (he was only twenty-seven), Purcell studied with Dr. Blow, and the two musicians were devoted comrades. Their tombs lie close together near the old entrance of the organ loft, where they must have spent many hours of their lives. Matthew Locke was also a friend of Purcell’s, and probably did much to interest the young composer in the drama, for in spite of his early church training, Purcell’s greatest offering to English music was his opera writing. While Purcell’s are not operas in our sense of the word, they are the nearest thing to them that England had, before the Italians came with theirs in the 18th century. He wrote music to masques and plays, several of which were even called operas, yet only one really was an opera. Purcell’s music “was so far in advance of anything of the sort known in any part of Europe in his day, in point of dramatic and musical freedom and scenic quality, that one can only regret his early death’s preventing his taking to opera writing on a larger scale.” (W. F. Apthorp.) Among the things he put to music were the plays of Dryden and of Beaumont and Fletcher.