This chapter introduces the musical lives of courtly women in Ferrara in the first half of the sixteenth century. It considers the importance of music in courtly women’s education and in the manifestation of their nobility, and the importance of musical women in the Este’s manifestation of civic and family magnificence. It looks at music dedicated to the two primary Este women of 1530s and 1540s, the Duchess Renée of France, wife of Duke Ercole II, and Laura Dianti, the morganatic third wife of Alfonso I. It pays particular attention to the four-voice madrigals published by Alfonso dalla Viola and Bertoldo Bertoldi, examining their relationship to courtly performance genres and contexts, including courtly song and theatre music. The chapter establishes some markers of Ferrarese style: melodic, harmonic and structural ingenuity.