Includes bibliographical references and index.

Introduction : The seventeenth century century and the history of music in Ireland / Barra Boydell & Kerry Houston -- Seventeenth-century Irish music and its cultural context / Raymond Gillespie -- Irish traditional music and the seventeenth century / Adrian Scahill -- 'Irish harpers are excellent, and their solemn music is much liked of strangers' : the Irish harp in non-Irish contexts in the seventeenth century John Cunningham -- The earl of Cork's musicians : music and patronage in early seventeenth-century Anglo-Irish society / Barra Boydell -- An early seventeenth-century library from Ulster : books on music in the library of Lord Edward Conway (1602-55) / Barra Boydell & Máire Egan-Buffet -- Birchensha's 'Mathematical way of composure' / Christopher D.S. Field -- Narcissus Marsh : groundbreaking bishop / Andrew Robinson -- Music fit for a king : the restoration of Charles II and the Dublin cathedral repertoire / Kerry Houston -- Seventeenth-century Irish parish church music / Denise Neary -- Purcell's 'curiously poor and perfunctory piece of work' : critical reflections on Purcell via his music for the centenary of Trinity College Dublin / Martin Adams.

This tenth volume in the series Irish Musical Studies is the first book to focus on music in seventeenth-century Ireland. Topics examined in the eleven essays include the historiography of seventeenth-century music in Ireland, its cultural context, traditional music, the Irish harp outside Ireland, the patronage of music within Anglo-Irish society, the theoretical writings of John Birchensha and of Narcissus Marsh, the Dublin cathedral repertoire, parish church music, and Henry Purcell's ode for the centenary of Trinity College Dublin.