For Francesco d'Avalos

The composer, conductor, and author Francesco d'Avalos, Prince d’Avalos and Marquis of Vasto and Pescara, great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandson of the uncle of Maria d'Avalos, the unlucky first wife of Carlo Gesualdo, died on May 26th at the age of eighty-four, at his palazzo in Naples. I visited him in 2011, and described the encounter at the end of my article on Gesualdo. Norman Lebrecht has a word or two about d'Avalos's work as a conductor.