John Farmer, born around 1570 and believed to have died sometime after 1601, perhaps as late as about 1605, occupies a curious and attractive place in the history of English Renaissance music. He was neither as prolific as Thomas Morley nor as institutionally prominent as William Byrd; he did not leave behind a large body of sacred music, a long record of court employment, or a biography richly documented by letters…
Compare Poets
Pick two poets who seem to have nothing to do with each other — a Gothic American and a pastoral Englishman, say — and see where the catalogue actually joins them: overlapping years, shared ground, distinctive themes, and the poems that secretly rhyme.
Poet A
John Farmer
Poet B
Thomas Vautor
Compare two related contemporaries
A random pair who overlapped in time and whose poems already rhyme in the catalogue — a way into poets you may not have met.
Kindred spirits
Their work already rhymes in the catalogue. The rest of this page is the story around that rhyme.
Biography 77%
Blended 77%
Swap sides
Another related pair
In the twilight of the English Renaissance, when the golden age of madrigal composition was drawing to its close, there emerged a composer whose work would serve as both culmination and farewell to one of England's most distinctive musical traditions. Thomas Vautor, active from approximately 1590 to 1625, stands as one of the final masters of the English madrigal school, a musician whose single published collection c…
In time
John Farmer
Thomas Vautor
1570
1619
They overlapped for 14 years (1592–1605).
When Thomas Vautor was born, John Farmer was about 22.
Thomas Vautor was about 13 when John Farmer died.
On the map
About 150 km separate London, England from Leicestershire, England. Shared ground: United Kingdom.
Thomas Vautor
Themes they return to
Distinctive words drawn from each poet’s critiqued poems — what they keep writing about, not just what their biographies mention.
No overlapping top terms in the poem critiques — any kinship may sit in mood rather than vocabulary.
From the biographies
patronage
music
composer
John Farmer: english madrigals, christ church cathedral, edward somerset, fair phyllis, the first set of english madrigals, elizabethan society, renaissance music, madrigal genre. Thomas Vautor: english madrigal school, beaumont family, glenfield, sir george villiers, marquis of buckingham, sweet suffolk owl, the first set, farewell to oriana.
Poems that secretly rhyme
The closest poem-to-poem matches in critique space — the sort of kinship a listener hears before the catalogue admits it.
The world around them
While their lives overlapped
Notable events from the years they were both alive.
1595
Execution at Tyburn
John Farmer
1602
Relocation to London
Emotional landscapes
John Farmer: Tenderness, Joy, Longing. Thomas Vautor: Sorrow, Spirituality, Despair.