Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643). Infuriating the music critics of his day by his willingness to forego Palestrinian polyphony, Claudio Monteverdi was among the first composers to embrace what became known as the seconda prattica – the emerging practices of the early Baroque period. Monteverdi’s style, which incorporated a new type of recitative into certain preexisting forms, gained wide acclaim after the early performances of his opera La favola d’Orfeo.