There are exactly five known instrumental works of Don Carlo Gesualdo; certainly the most famous of these is the Gagliarda del Principe di Venosa. This comes from a manuscript collection of late Neapolitan Renaissance dances cataloged as No. 4.6.3. in the Naples Conservatory di San Pietro a Majella. Among the other composers who appear in this same source are Giovanni de Macque and Giovanni Trabaci, both of whom were known to Gesualdo on a personal basis, so that there is little doubt of the work's authenticity. The date of the work is unknown; theoretically it could've been written anywhere from 1585 up to Gesualdo's death in 1613. The collection in which it appears seems to have been put together in the years after Gesualdo died, probably in 1614-1620.

This little Galliard, barely two minutes in length, is also in keeping stylistically with Gesualdo's harmonic approach, as it is largely made up of wandering chord progressions that fit alongside the five-step pattern of the galliard. Two or three short phrases even "sigh" in the fashion of Gesualdo's late madrigals. Scored in four voices and ostensibly for organ, it has been played in a variety of arrangements by groups in up to consort-sized ensembles. The Gagliarda del Principe di Venosa has captured the imagination of contemporary composers, for example Italian post-modernist Salvatore Sciarrino, who orchestrated and partly recomposed the piece as part of his work for voice and ensemble, Le voci sottovetro (1998).

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