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The exact specification of instruments in vocal/instrumental music begins in the final decades of the sixteenth century in Italy and gains momentum in the early decades of the seventeenth, including in church music. Trombones, in particular, are increasingly specified and were often used interchangeably with voices. The early Italian concerted motets and instrumental works of this program contain explicit parts for trombones and document this tendency towards the naming of particular instruments and the composition of idiomatic parts for them. Many of the works stem from an anthology of seventeenth-century small-scale Italian motets with specified trombone parts—a critical edition published with A-R Editions (Pearse, Yale University Press, 2014). The June 2016 Berkeley Early Music Festival performance mounts a performance of the works from Linda Pearse's publication (the first in the United States) and brings many of these unknown yet worthy works to our audience. One of the pieces provides an important part of the context of one of the most famous works in the entire repertory: the Sonata sopra Sancta Maria from the Vespro della Beata Vergine by Monteverdi. Beatus vir qui suffert / Sancte N. by Federico Cauda, is set for a canto voice repeating the Sancta Maria chant above more quickly moving instrumental lines. In addition, it has two vocal parts for tenor and bass carrying the Beatus vir qui suffert text that are set in an imitative style with two instruments, violin and bass trombone, as well as organ. The works are representative of different musical types, which along with their inherent beauty formed the criteria for choosing them. In the final decades of the sixteenth century and early decades of the seventeenth century there was a radical development in compositional style. New modes of expression were sought and with the introduction of the basso continuo, formal and textural variety resulted. It is of particular interest that this new way of music-making did not replace the older compositional style of imitative polyphony. The works reflect this coexistence of compositional styles and the experimental dynamic of this time: some works are clearly rooted in the older imitative polyphonic style; others, firmly in the newer style employing basso continuo, monody and sectional forms; and finally, some combine elements of both. The majority of small-scale Italian works from this period that contain specified trombones parts primarily use the trombone to double the basso continuo line. To be sure, works representative of this dominant use have been included; however, works that employ the trombone in a more virtuosic or independent manner have been sought out as well. It is in the latter that the newer style and the freedom won with the implementation of the basso continuo result in more variety and flexibility in the instrumental parts.