John Dowland (1563-1626) was a composer of Renaissance England and considered one of the most prolific and well-known composers of English songs for the lute. An accomplished composer and lutenist, he is probably the most traveled English composer of his time. Through his travels he was exposed to the musical elements of his Italian, French and German contemporaries. He developed his own musical language, in which he created a unique song style for the lute. As a composer, he focused on developing melodic material and was able to elegantly blend words and music with a wide range of emotion and technique. For the purposes of this paper we will focus on the influence of his travels in Italy. John Dowland's use of chromaticism in his lute songs can be directly associated with "All Ye That Love or Have Fortune". In these pieces, we can see the influence on this genre through his travels in Italy and meetings with composers like Marenzio. A cosmopolitan composer, John Dowland's music displays elements of the madrigal style of his Italian contemporaries through his use of chromaticism in lute songs. Let's start by giving a brief overview of the lute and its function. In the 15th century there was an evolution in playing the lute. It had been played in an ensemble with a plectrum, an instrument used for plucking or strumming a stringed instrument. This technique limited the player to single-line melodies. The technique evolved into strings being plucked with the player's fingers, thus making it possible for the lutenist to play complex polyphonies and transform the lute into a solo instrument that plays two, three, or even four musical lines simultaneously. Thanks to this development the lute was transformed into an autonomous object... medium of paper... phew the publication of his madrigals in Nicholas Yonge's 1588 publication Musica transalpine, in which Marenzio's works were second in number. Dowland is believed to have gone to Italy with the intention of meeting and perhaps even studying with Marenzio in Rome, although there is no evidence that the introduction ever took place. We may not know for sure whether Marenzio and Dowland ever met or not, but we know we can definitely see Marenzio's musical influence in Dowland's lute songs. Let's first look at the Works Cited from the Atlas, Allan W. Renaissance Music: Music in Western Europe, 1400-1600. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1998. Poulton, Diana. John Dowland: His Life and Works. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1972. Smith, Douglas Alton. A history of the lute from antiquity to the Renaissance. Massechusett: The Lute Society of America, Inc., 2002.