This volume presents four of the earliest Italian manuscript collections of keyboard dances and dance songs, dating from about 1540 to c.1620 and vividly demonstrates the development of early keyboard writing from the pre-existing repertoire of the lute. The majority of these short and expressive pieces are transcribed into modern notation here for the first time, and their origins fully documented with concordances. Such repertoire is suitable for any keyboard instrument and (apart from the "lost" piece by Facoli which ends the volume) are of slight technical difficulty and suitable for students and beginners, as well as for use by early music ensembles.