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In 1587, when the Cremona native Claudio Monteverdi (1567–1643) offered his first book of madrigals for printing, the popularity of the genre of little vocal pieces had just reached its pinnacle. Such great madrigalists as Luca Marenzio or Philippe de Monte where among the most distinguished composers of the day, and Palestrina, the great master of counterpoint, he just published his second book of madrigals a year earlier. Three years later, Monteverdi was employed as a singer and violist at the court of Vincenzo Gonzaga in Mantua, and the compositions published in his second volume of madrigals immediately made him a rising star among the Italian masters. Without exaggeration, we can call madrigals like Non si levava ancor or Ecco mormorar l’onde the hits of their day. In them, Monteverdi exhibits a highly advanced use of imitation and counterpoint by Italian standards, and he is innovative in his treatment of tone painting and in his a keen feeling for sustaining a dramatic arch extending above the individual compositions.