Pomponio Nenna was born in 1556 in Bari and studied there under Stefano Felis. He then moved to Naples, where he began his career as a composer in a stimulating spirit of competition; Nenna and Carlo Gesualdo influenced each other's madrigal style, particularly in their treatment of text, dissonance, and chromatic modulation. Nenna's vocal works are here complemented by a series of organ works by local composers such as Giovanni Maria Trabaci and Giovanni de Macque, which have been transcribed for a violin consort.