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Alonso Xuares was an eminent composer of music of the first style, that is to say, sacred music in Latin, nearly all of it for double or triple choir. Born at Cuenca c. 1630, Xuares became maestro of the Cathedral there in 1654. So distinguished was his service and his reputation that in 1675 the chapter of Seville Cathedral offered him the maestría there without the usual three-day examinations. Whil e at Seville, he produced a considerable body of polychoral masses, motets and vesper settings. Eight years later, however, he returned to Cuenca because of ill health; without resuming the burdens of directorship, he continued to compose for the Cathedral until his death in 1696.