Composer, Instrumentalist. He is regarded as the outstanding Baroque creator of music for viols, the predecessors of the modern string family. Viol consorts flourished in England during the 17th Century and Jenkins wrote over 1000 surviving pieces for these ensembles, mostly in the form of suites, fantasias, and dances. In some of these he tried to depict extra-musical events, an early example of the program music later favored by the Romantics. Jenkins was born in Maidstone, Kent, the son of a carpenter. Although he was a virtuoso performer - he had mastered the treble, tenor, bass, and Lyra viols, as well as the lute - he spent most of his life as a domestic musician and tutor to several noble families. During England's Civil War and Commonwealth periods (1642 to 1660) he exiled himself to the provinces, finding perilous refuge in royalist homes. With the restoration of the monarchy in 1660, Jenkins was finally given a court post by King Charles II. By then he was too old and frail to be of much service, but respect for him was so great he was given full salary in absentia. His tombstone at Kimberley reads: "Ag'd 86: October twenty sev'n, In anno seventy eight he went to heav'n." Jenkins's life had spanned England's greatest musical period, from the rise of the madrigal to the emergence of Henry Purcell, and in the field of chamber music he contributed to this flowering. The revival of Early Music performance in the years following World War II created renewed interest in Jenkins, whose enormous body of work is still being mined for fresh insights into his era.
Composer, Instrumentalist. He is regarded as the outstanding Baroque creator of music for viols, the predecessors of the modern string family. Viol consorts flourished in England during the 17th Century and Jenkins wrote over 1000 surviving pieces for these ensembles, mostly in the form of suites, fantasias, and dances. In some of these he tried to depict extra-musical events, an early example of the program music later favored by the Romantics. Jenkins was born in Maidstone, Kent, the son of a carpenter. Although he was a virtuoso performer - he had mastered the treble, tenor, bass, and Lyra viols, as well as the lute - he spent most of his life as a domestic musician and tutor to several noble families. During England's Civil War and Commonwealth periods (1642 to 1660) he exiled himself to the provinces, finding perilous refuge in royalist homes. With the restoration of the monarchy in 1660, Jenkins was finally given a court post by King Charles II. By then he was too old and frail to be of much service, but respect for him was so great he was given full salary in absentia. His tombstone at Kimberley reads: "Ag'd 86: October twenty sev'n, In anno seventy eight he went to heav'n." Jenkins's life had spanned England's greatest musical period, from the rise of the madrigal to the emergence of Henry Purcell, and in the field of chamber music he contributed to this flowering. The revival of Early Music performance in the years following World War II created renewed interest in Jenkins, whose enormous body of work is still being mined for fresh insights into his era.
Bio by: Bobb Edwards
Inscription
Under this stone Rare Jenkins lie
The master of the Musick Art
Whome from ye Earth the God on High
Call'd Upto Him to bear his part
Ag'd eighty six: October twenty sev'n
In Anno seventy eight he went to Heav'n
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