Antonio de Cabezón (30 March 1510 – 26 March 1566) was a Spanish Renaissance composer and organist, born at Castrillo Mota de Judíos near Burgos. Blind from early childhood, he was probably taught at Palencia Cathedral by its organist García de Baeza, and in 1526 he entered the service of the Empress Isabella of Portugal as clavichordist and organist of her chapel. In 1538 he was made músico de la cámara to Charles V, and after Isabella’s death in 1539 he taught her children, later becoming court organist to the future Philip II. He accompanied the prince on extended journeys to Italy, the Netherlands, Germany and England between the late 1540s and 1556, and died in Madrid in 1566.

Cabezón is regarded as the first major Iberian keyboard composer and one of the most important instrumental composers of the sixteenth century. A few pieces appeared in Luis Venegas de Henestrosa’s Libro de cifra nueva (1557), but the bulk of his surviving output was published posthumously by his son Hernando as Obras de música para tecla, arpa y vihuela (Madrid, 1578), a volume of some 275 works including tientos, liturgical versets, glosas on vocal models and sets of diferencias. His variation technique is often cited as a possible influence on the English virginalists he may have encountered during Philip’s visit to England, among them William Byrd and Thomas Tallis. Because he was celebrated above all as an improviser, Hernando described the printed pieces as “mere crumbs from my father’s table”.

Sources:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonio_de_Cabez%C3%B3n