A violist of international fame, Luis de Narváez (c. 1503-1547), of Granada, was one of the chief agents in the birth of instrumental music and accompanied monody in Europe, being the forerunner in such practices by nearly fifty years of the Florentine composers of the late Renaissance, such as Peri, Caccini and Rinuccini.

In his book of works for viol alone and for viol and song (1538), he used for the first time the term “difference” to designate certain groups of pieces, together with special symbols to indicate the tempo. Narváez’s relation with the international court of Charles V was decisive for the change in musical taste in Spain and the approximation to the leading currents in the Europe of the time.