Henry Purcell was an English composer of Baroque music, most remembered for his more than 100 songs; a tragic opera, Dido and Aeneas; and his incidental music to a version of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream called The Fairy Queen.
Purcell's musical style was uniquely English, although it incorporated Italian and French elements. Generally considered among the greatest English opera composers, Purcell has been assessed with John Dunstaple and William Byrd as England's most important early music composer.
From Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Purcell) under Creative Commons Attribution CC-BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/legalcode)