The Spinacino Consort will perform four concerts that will explore the influence of Isabella d’Este, la prima donna del mondo, over the first music prints of Ottaviano Petrucci. Born in Ferrara to the d’Este dynasty, Isabella enjoyed singing and lute tuition from some of the finest Franco-Flemish musicians who composed large works of polyphonic complexity. However, it was her passion for the native Italian forms of sung improvised poetry that led to her patronage of Italian artists and the development of frottola. It was these genres which Petrucci used to establish his printing press for a new middle-class market looking to emulate nobility.