John Dunstaple: Secret Knowledge of the Stars

John Dunstaple or Dunstable died on December 24, 1453. As this website notes, he is sometimes considered the greatest English composer before William Byrd:

We know so little about him that almost the only sure historical fact is that he died on Christmas Eve 1453. Beyond that, the inscription of his epitaph describes his different professions, and in a book on astronomy in St John's College, Cambridge, he states in his own hand that he was a musician in the service of the Duke of Bedford.

The fact that much of his music survives in Continental sources suggests that his fame was widespread. Fifty-five works that are normally considered as by Dunstable survive, including two complete Masses (one isorhythmic) and several paired and single Mass sections, a large number of motets, and possibly two secular songs.

Thus all that we have of his music is in the form of liturgical or votive church music; what may be counted as secular music amounts to so little that even the most celebrated 'O rosa bella' is not his for certain. What is certain is that Dunstable was the greatest English composer before William Byrd. He was the man whose 'contenance anglaise' influenced music for a century. it did so abecause of his residence in France for a number of years as musician to John, Duke of Bedford—Henry V's brother and Regent of France from 1422 to 1435. It seems likely that the composer visited Italy also, judging from the number of his works that exist in Italian manuscripts.

Of course he wrote many works in honor of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, including this one:

Nesciens mater virgo virum peperit sine dolore salvatorem saeculorum. Ipsum regem angelorum sola virgo lactabat, ubere de celo plena. 

Knowing no man, the Virgin mother bore, without pain, the Saviour of the world. Him, the king of angels, only the Virgin suckled, breasts filled by heaven.

The cover of the Orlando Consort recording pictured above cites his epitaph. He was buried in St. Stephen Walbrook and a plaque with his epitaph was recreated after the church was bombed in the Second World War:

He is closed within this tomb who closed the heavens in his breast, John Dunstable. He, privy to the stars, with Urania his mentor, knew how to reveal the secrets of the sky. This man was your glory, O Music, your light, a prince for you; throughout the world he has spread your five sweet modes. Join to the year one thousand four hundred and fifty and three, on the day before the birth of Christ, his star was translated to the constellations; let the inhabitants of the sky receive to themselves a fitting fellow-citizen.

We are fortunate that John Dunstable's works were published on the Continent, because only 20 survive in English choir books. As the website at St. Stephen Walbrook notes, Dunstable had connections to one of the greatest Benedictine abbeys of Medieval England, St. Albans:

Dunstaple’s connections with St Albans Abbey are at least twofold:

The abbot John Whethamstede is associated with the Duke of Gloucester (who was buried at St Albans following his death in 1447), and Dunstaple’s isorhythmic motet Albanus roseo rutilat, possibly with some of the Latin words adapted by Whethamstede from an older poem, was clearly written for St Albans, possibly for a visit to the abbey by the Duke of Bedford in 1426.

Whethamstede’s plan for a magnificent library for the abbey in 1452-3 included a set of twelve stained glass windows devoted to the various branches of learning. Dunstaple is clearly, if indirectly, referred to in some of the verses the abbot composed for each window, not only music but also astronomy, medicine, and astrology.

This website has quite a bit of information about St. Albans Abbey at the time of its dissolution in December of 1539. The abbey church was saved for the community and there were hopes of re-establishing the monastery when Queen Mary I reigned. Now the church is an Anglican cathedral.The cathedral's website has news that the grave of Dunstable's abbot, John Whethamstede has been discovered!

Merry Christmas!

The "Battle" for Evensong

BBC Four is advertising a programme to be broadcast on October 17 hosted by Lucy Worsley with the title "Elizabeth I's Battle for God's Music"!

Lucy Worsley investigates the story of the most remarkable creation from the tumultuous and violent era known as the Reformation - choral evensong.

Henry VIII loved religious music, but he loved power more - when he instigated his English Reformation he dramatically split from the ancient Catholic church that controlled much of his country. But in doing so set into motion changes that would fundamentally transform the religious music he loved.

Following Elizabeth I's personal story, Lucy recounts how she and her two siblings were shaped by the changes their father instigated. Elizabeth witnessed both her radically puritan brother Edward bring church music to the very brink of destruction and the terrifying reversals made by her sister Mary - which saw her thrown in the Tower of London forced to beg for her life.

When Elizabeth finally took power she was determined to find a religious compromise - she resurrected the Protestant religion of her brother, but kept the music of her beloved father - music that she too adored. And it was in the evocative service of choral evensong that her ideas about religious music found their ultimate expression.

I know that conflict is what drives plot and that there was lots of conflict during the English Reformation, but some of this language seems a bit over the top! 

Henry VIII never experienced Evensong so his links to Elizabeth's version of "God's Music" seem weak. In what way did the "ancient Catholic church control much" of England? As Thomas More's Poor Souls protested to Henry VIII in The Supplication of Souls, it was clear who had the authority in England--Simon Fish had stated that the Catholic Church was preventing Henry from ruling his people but More denied that completely. Henry VIII was, even before his split from the universal Church, deeply involved in naming bishops, communicating with Church hierarchy--Bishops and Archbishops served the monarchy in diplomacy and administration--the Church and State were separate powers, but they had worked together smoothly for years. Remember that Henry VIII, like his father, even had Cardinal Protectors to argue English positions on ecclesiastical issues to the Pope and the Curia in Rome

Did Edward VI really "bring church music to the very brink of destruction"? Listening to Thomas Tallis's English anthems from that reign might bring that into question. Tallis would compose music for English translations of the Psalms for Archbishop of Canterbury Matthew Parker during Elizabeth I's reign too. Edward VI's reign, through Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer's creation of The Book of Common Prayer, made Evensong possible, combining Vespers and Compline into one prayer service.

What terrifying reversals in Church music did Mary I make? Seems like Worsley is mixing things up here a little bit, referring to the restoration of Catholic worship and unity with the Catholic Church, and the revival of the Heresy Laws by Parliament in the context of changes in religious musical styles. I don't think those reversals "saw" Elizabeth thrown into the Tower, but the Wyatt Rebellion and concerns about Elizabeth's involvement in it as the one who would replace Mary on the throne. Elizabeth I would throw many people into the Tower whenever she felt threatened too. 

Shouldn't Mary's restoration of English polyphony be the main point of this discussion? If Edward was bringing it to the brink of destruction, didn't Mary save it? 

It's a little strong to say that Elizabeth I "was determined to find a religious compromise"; I think most scholars agree that Elizabeth was pragmatic and her Parliament created the religious settlement she wanted but I doubt that she thought of it as a compromise.

Image (public domain): The Pelican Portrait by Nicholas Hilliard. The pelican was thought to wound her breast to nourish her young, and became a symbol of Passion and Eucharist, adopted by Elizabeth portraying herself as the "mother of the Church of England."

Perhaps we'll see it here in the USA on PBS someday to see how this history is really presented.

A Lady Mass by Nicholas Ludford for Henry and Katherine

The Vynes is a Tudor era house maintained by the National Trust. It's in Hampshire near Basingstoke and Henry VIII visited it, since it was the home of William Sandys, 1st Baron Sandys, one of his favorite courtiers.

The National Trust has organized an aural experience which recreates a sixteenth century celebration of Holy Mass:

An audio illusion that brings to life the sounds of a Tudor Lady Mass has been unveiled at The Vyne, where Henry VIII would have heard it almost 500 years ago. This unique National Trust soundscape immerses listeners in the prayers, chants, even movements of choristers and clergy.

You’ll hear the subtle change in volume of the priest’s voice as he turns from the altar, the clink of the thurible chain as incense is blessed, even the faint rustle of clothing. These details have been captured to enhance the sense of reality in The Vyne’s 16th-century chapel.

This is the first time a ‘soundscape’ of the Lady Mass – in honour of the Blessed Virgin Mary - has been created as Henry VIII would have known it. It features 16th-century composer Nicholas Ludford’s elaborate polyphonic music for boys’ voices.

Nicholas Ludford was a favorite composer of Henry VIII and Katherine of Aragon, according to this website:

The Lady Masses are the sole contents of Royal Appendix MSS. 45-48, four very neat and accurately copied partbooks which have the arms of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon stamped on their leather covers. Since a manuscript devoted to a single composer's works is exceptional, one wonders if Ludford himself produced them as a gift to the royal couple. The presence of Catherine's arms as well as Henry's gives as the outside dates for the manuscript's production 1509, the year of the royal marriage, and 1533, the year of the divorce; but the latest probable date would be several years before 1533, because the two royal establishments were separate from 1531, and the divorce had been in Henry's mind since the late 1520s.

The Lady Masses constitute the only sizeable body of three-part church music surviving from sixteenth-century England. The scoring for treble, mean and countertenor, without use of the bass register, and the frequent presentation of cantus firmi in the lowest voice are traits as apparently old-fashioned as the choice of three parts itself, but the style and cadence practice of the Lady Masses are very much of the early sixteenth century; in particular imitation is often present, and there are occasional brief sequences. Much of Ludford's writing in the Lady Masses has a notable grace and fluency, with a fondness for movement in parallel thirds which is slightly more pronounced in his work than in that of other composers.

And Gramophone reviewed this recording of one of Ludford's Lady Masses:

Nicholas Ludford is one of the most intriguing of early Tudor composers, a healthy proportion of whose surviving work has made it to the discography. Somewhat surprisingly, though, none of his set of seven Lady Masses has so far been committed to disc as far as I know. This new recording fills a gap in the catalogue, then – indeed, it does rather more than that, for these three-voice works are subtly different in style from Ludford’s festal Masses, the polyphony less florid, though just as beguiling. Ludford set only alternative verses of the Mass sections, leaving the others to be sung in plainchant, but Ensemble Scandicus go one better here, setting some of these plainchant verses polyphonically in an improvised style known as ‘faburden’, at times stretching to three added voices. This practice, though well documented, is seldom attempted in modern-day recordings, so their initiative is particularly welcome, opening as it does a window on to a literally unsung aspect of early Renaissance polyphony.

Music and History: 1554-1555

From Gallicantus and Gabriel Crouch comes another historically themed CD of music at the Court during Queen Mary I's phantom pregnancy of 1554-1555:

Long-awaited news of a Tudor royal birth winged its way to London on 30 April 1555. A male heir had been born: a pledge of dynastic fertility after decades of royal stillbirths, miscarriages and marital misadventures. This was surely a sign of God’s pleasure with Mary I (1516-1558) and a vindication of her mission to restore Catholic religion, reverse the doctrinal experiments of the previous two decades, and return England to its historic place in Europe. The bells of London accordingly rang out while Te Deum laudamus, the traditional hymn of thanksgiving, was sung by the city’s choirs.

The festivities came to an abrupt end on 1 May. Yesterday’s news had been a mere rumour: there was to be no royal birth, not yet at least. ‘It turned out otherwise to the pleasure of God’, wrote the merchant-tailor Henry Machyn, assuring himself that the birth would happen ‘whenever it pleases God’. At thirty-nine years old Queen Mary was superannuated by sixteenth-century obstetric standards, but her pregnancy was generally deemed credible and she had not yet come to term by 1 May. The summer months drew on, but still no news. Long after the original due date, Mary eventually gave up hope, withdrawing from Hampton Court to Oatlands Palace in the first days of August.

There would be no apotheosis in 1555, but it had been tantalizingly imminent. This disc explores the musical traces of an extraordinary year of hopes raised and dashed. The music performed here resonates with the circumstances of the mid-1550s, even if some of the items were composed outside Mary’s own reign; some pieces stemmed from the royal ceremonies in which Mary participated as queen; and some of the music sung here can be directly tied to the specific events of 1554-5, including a newly-reconstructed Litany which was performed during Mary’s assumed pregnancy. The viewpoint shifts from the streets of London and its suburbs, through the ceremonial grandeur of the royal palaces and their chapels, to the intimacy of the queen’s birthing chamber.

You may listen to samples here and read the entire booklet here. Several of the compositions are by John Sheppard, and Hyperion offers this biography:

John Sheppard (c1515–1558) is thought to have been a chorister at St Paul’s Cathedral in or around 1530, although information supporting this theory has proved difficult to come by. By Michaelmas 1543 he is known to have been Informator Choristarum (director of music) at Magdalen College Oxford, where he is reputed to have blotted his copybook through various misdeeds. On further investigation, this mistaken allegation has arisen from a misreading of the college’s records: it was Richard Sheppar (and not Sheppard) who was the culprit. Sheppard later appears in the records of the Chapel Royal (from 1547).

Sadly, much of Sheppard’s music has been lost. His compositions survive in partbooks at Christ Church Oxford, and testify to the elaborate style of church music from the reign of Mary Tudor (1553–1558). . . . 

He is best known today for his Media Vita ("In the midst of life"), an appropriate antiphon for Lent.

Tallis is dead, and Music dies

Thomas Tallis died on November 23, 1585 (Julian Calendar). William Byrd wrote this elegy for his colleague:

Ye sacred Muses, race of Jove, whom 

Music's lore delighteth,

Come down from crystal heav'ns above

to earth where sorrow dwelleth,

In mourning weeds, with tears in eyes:

Tallis is dead, and Music dies.

As Naxos notes, the religious changes of the Tudor dynasty influenced Tallis's career and composition styles:

The career of the English composer Thomas Tallis spans the troubled period of the reign of Henry VIII, with the sequestration of monastic property, the Protestant regime of his successor, the re-establishment of Catholicism under Queen Mary, and the subsequent changes under Queen Elizabeth. These political and religious upheavals had an obvious effect on music and musicians. Tallis began his career as organist at the Benedictine Priory at Dover, followed by similar service at Waltham Abbey until the dissolution of the monasteries in 1540. He was then organist at Canterbury Cathedral and in 1543 became a Gentleman of the Chapel Royal, a position he retained until his death. Like Byrd, his pupil, he seems to have remained loyal to the old religion while nevertheless continuing to enjoy royal favour.

Not English, But Russian, Polyphony

As the liner notes to this new recording of Maximilian Steinberg's Passion Week informed me, the composer was the pupil and son-in-law of Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov, who had a great deal of influence on Russian Orthodox sacred choral music in his time:

The achievements of the ‘new Russian choral school’ in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries have been widely recognised in the musical world. In the course of this veritable renaissance of new compositions and arrangements for unaccompanied choral voices, a pleiad of composers, spearheaded by Pyotr Tchaikovsky, and followed by Alexander Kastalsky, Pavel Chesnokov, Alexander Gretchaninov, Viktor Kalinnikov, Alexander Nikolsky, and Sergey Rachmaninov, to name just a few, explored the sonorous and expressive capabilities of the choral instrument to an unprecedented degree. They sought out new ways of evoking the splendour of the ‘Kingdom of God on earth,’ joining the spiritual depth of ancient Christian liturgical texts and chants with transcendently  beautiful choral polyphony.

Generally speaking, this school is associated with the city of Moscow, and in particular with the Moscow Synodal School of Church Singing and Moscow Synodal Choir. Indeed, many of the composers—Kastalsky, Kalinnikov, Nikolsky, and Chesnokov—were affiliated with the Synodal School, and important premieres such as Rachmaninov’s All-Night Vigil and Gretchaninov’s Passion Week, took place in Moscow. Less known is the role played in this movement by composers whose primary sphere of activity was in St Petersburg, regarded as a more Western-looking bastion of modernity and the avant-garde.

Nonetheless, St Petersburg was not altogether unaffected by the general movement in the liturgical arts towards the recovery of a more traditional, nationally Russian and Eastern Orthodox style. In the realm of church architecture, this was reflected by the construction of such edifices as the Dormition Cathedral, the Church of the Saviour on the Blood, and the Naval Cathedral of St Nicholas in Kronstadt, all completed in the early twentieth century. In the realm of Russian Orthodox sacred choral music, the most important figure was Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov (1844–1908), and a number of composers who were in one way or another connected with him: Anatol Liadov (1855–1914), Sergey Liapunov (1859–1924), Nikolay Tcherepnin (1873–1945), and Alexander Chesnokov (1880–1941), whose contributions to sacred choral music have yet to be thoroughly explored. Even less known is the remarkable work featured on the present recording—Passion Week, composed by Rimsky-Korsakov’s favourite student and son-in-law, Maximilian Steinberg (1883–1946).

Rimsky-Korsakov’s involvement with the choral church music of the Russian Orthodox Church dates from his tenure at the Imperial Court Chapel from 1883 to 1894, as assistant to Mily Balakirev. While there, he was involved with producing polyphonic arrangements of traditional unison chants, and also wrote a number of compositions in a deliberately simple yet original style, in accordance with the emerging national character of Russian church music. Although after leaving the Chapel, Rimsky-Korsakov wrote no more choral music for the church, he evidently transmitted his exploration of early chants, as well as some degree of familiarity with the sources of ecclesiastical melodies, to his students. Some fifteen years after his death, this knowledge manifested itself most wondrously in Maximilian Steinberg’s Passion Week.

This sacred polyphony has not been without controversy, however, as this website demonstrates:

the use of Western-style polyphony in church has been opposed in recent centuries by several saints (including St. Seraphim of Sarov; [14]St. Philaret Drozdov, Metropolitan of Moscow; [15] St. Ignatius Brianchaninov; [16] St. Barsanuphius, Elder of Optina; [17] and the New Martyr St. Andronik Archbishop of Perm) as well as by the Holy Synod of Constantinople, [18] the Holy Synod of the Church of Greece, [19] and by many venerable hierarchs (such as Patriarch Germogen of Russia [20] in the seventeenth century, Metropolitan Evgeny of Kiev [21] in the eighteenth century, and Archbishop Averky of Syracuse and Holy Trinity Monastery [Jordanville] in the twentieth century). Nevertheless, other saints (primarily some of the New Martyrs of twentieth-century Russia) and other hierarchs used and loved Western-style polyphonic ecclesiastical music because they appreciated its beauty. Their acceptance is perfectly understandable, since musical preferences are not dogmatic issues but are dependent upon cultural circumstances and personal taste. Besides, if, according to St. John of the Ladder, lovers of God are moved to spiritual joy, to divine love, and to tears even by worldly songs, [22] incomparably more so will they be inspired by hymns, even if their melodies are of a worldly character or bear some of the aforementioned shortcomings.

Father Stravinskas on William Byrd

The Catholic World Report published this homily by Father Peter Stravinskas about William Byrd:

Byrd’s Catholic commitment found expression in his many motets with themes highlighting the persecution of the Chosen People in the Old Testament and their long-awaited deliverance. Who could not see (and hear) in these works an application to the plight of Catholics during the reign of Elizabeth? Interestingly, even though known to be a recusant (that is, one who refused to attend Anglican services), he continued to enjoy royal favor. Can we say that the Queen was so captivated by the beauty of his work that she was led to a good action in his regard – turning a blind eye to his practice of the Catholic Faith? Even more bizarre is the fact that the Episcopal Church in the United States honors Byrd with a feast in their liturgical calendar on November 21; just another sign of Anglican confusion, I suppose.

Byrd is also well known for his magnificent Mass compositions for three, four and five voices. You have heard some of them in this very church, and his Mass for Four Voices enhances our worship this evening. Most devotees of Byrd’s Masses, however, do not realize that they were not composed for and performed in grand cathedrals – those edifices had been purloined by the Protestants. No, those masterpieces were sung at “priest-hole” Masses – clandestine liturgies celebrated by priests under a death sentence and attended by laity whose very lives and fortunes were at stake for participating in “popish” worship.

Even in such dire straits, Byrd and the Catholic faithful wished to offer to the Triune God their very best and to be nourished themselves by those soaring melodies which brought them to contemplate heavenly realities.

Read the rest there.

CD of the Month: The Lily and the Lamb

Traditionally, September is dedicated to the Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin Mary, as the Catholic Culture website explains:

The month of September (Overview - Calendar) is dedicated to the Seven Sorrows of Mary. Devotion to the sorrows of the Virgin Mary dates from the twelfth century, when it made its appearance in monastic circles under the influence of St. Anselm and St. Bernard. The Cistercians and then the Servites undertook to propagate it. It became widespread in the fourteenth and especially the fifteenth centuries, particularly in the Rhineland and Flanders, where Confraternities of the Sorrowful Mother sprang up. It was in this context that the first liturgical formularies in her honor were composed. A provincial council of Mainz in 1423 made use of these in establishing a "Feast of the Sorrows of Mary" in reparation for Hussite profanations of her images.

In 1494 the feast appeared in Bruges, where the Precious Blood of Christ was venerated; later on it made its way into France. It did not, however, become widespread in France before Benedict XIII included it in the Roman Calendar in 1727 and assigned it to the Friday before Palm Sunday.

We started the month on Thursday by listening to Anonymous 4's 1995 release, The Lily & The Lamb: chant & polyphony from medieval England. As the group describes the music on their website:

This program consists of medieval English chant, polyphony and poetry from the thirteenth through early fifteenth centuries and is built around three thirteenth century British (sic) versions of the sequence describing Mary’s experiences at the foot of the cross. The first setting, Stabat iuxta Christi crucem, a monophonic Latin work from the Irish Dublin Troper, tells the story simply and movingly, in the voice of a narrator, The second, Stond wel, moder, under roode, is based on the original Latin work, but is much longer and more elaborate. The English text of this work is written as a dialogue between Mary and her dying son. The third work, Jesu Cristes milde moder, also in English, is the most elaborate of the three settings. Melodically unrelated to the others, this version is polyphonic, set for two hypnotically intertwining voices. Its story is told in the voice of a narrator, and, like many of the works on this program, it is quite graphic in its depiction of the scene at Calvary.

You might note that the CD cover illustration is a detail from Matthias Grunewald's Isenheim altarpiece, constructed and designed for a hospital run by the Brothers of St. Anthony for lepers and those suffering from other skin diseases, including St. Anthony's Fire (Ergotism). More about this fantastic piece of art here. 

And more about the Seven Sorrows of Mary and the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross in this article I wrote for OSV's The Catholic Answer Magazine a few years ago. I clarify the different statuses of the Feast of Our Lord and the memorial of Our Lady:

Each September the Church celebrates the feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross on Sept. 14, and the memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows follows on Sept. 15.

The pairing of these celebrations, even in their different levels on the liturgical and sanctoral calendars, properly guides us in our levels of devotion and love of our Savior and Our Lady. He is our Divine Redeemer, to be worshiped and adored; she is His first disciple and our example. Both of these celebrations have a long history and are worthy of meditation.

Anonymous 4 has stopped touring and Harmonia Mundi will release a final CD of "greatest hits" later this month: Thirty Years of Anonymous 4:

The ladies of the chart-topping vocal quartet Anonymous 4, famed for their 'unearthly' vocal blend and purity of sound, have triumphed in concert on three continents; their listeners have bought nearly two million copies of the group’s recordings for harmonia mundi. This retrospective collection includes highlights from their 25-year collaboration with harmonia mundi, with repertoire ranging from 12th-Century ecstatic chant to American roots.

What a perfect cover!

Musical Life of English Catholics: Which Catholics?

In New York this Friday at St. Vincent Ferrer Church: "The Musical Life of Catholics Under Elizabeth", sponsored by The Society of St. Hugh of Cluny:

This event explores the riches of English Catholic musical and religious culture under the Tudors. The lecture by Dr. Samuel Schmitt will describe the musical life of recusant Catholics in the time of Elizabeth, with live examples provided by Grant and Priscilla Herreid and Charles Weaver. The mass which follows, in the traditional Dominican rite, features the Missa Regali of Robert Fayrfax, essentially in its original liturgical context, in the English Gothic Revival setting of the Church of St. Vincent Ferrer. The contrast in musical styles will serve to highlight what was lost and what was gained in sacred music in the tumultuous passing from the age of Fayrfax to that of Byrd.

Samuel A. Schmitt has dedicated the better part of twenty years to making beautiful music for the Church as an organist, conductor, composer, teacher, and choral singer. He studied the Solesmes method of chant with Dr. Theodore Marier at the Catholic University of America, and earned both a master’s degree in liturgical music with a concentration in organ performance, and a doctorate in musicology for his research into the music and liturgical practice of persecuted Catholics in Elizabethan England. Dr. Schmitt has served as music director and organist at churches in several states and was an assistant organist at the Cathedral of St. Matthew and the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, both in Washington, DC. He currently serves as assistant organist at St. Theresa’s Church in Trumbull, CT, while promoting the artistic legacy of his grandfather as executive director of the Carl Schmitt Foundation.

Of course, I can't attend, but I wonder if Dr. Schmitt will discuss the different musical experiences of Recusant Catholics and Church Papists. Church Papists, attending Church of England services in public conformity and Catholic Mass secretly, would experience the full Anglican development of both vernacular and Latin church music, especially if they attended services in any Royal Chapel or at the Universities. A few recusant Catholics, attending Mass secretly, might have heard the Masses and Gradualia composed by William Byrd or Thomas Tallis--if they could attend Mass in the embassy chapels of Catholic countries like Spain or Portugal, they would hear Victoria or Palestrina. I would think the musical experience of English Catholics would be quite varied, and could be determined by class and rank, and certainly by location. Perhaps I'll ask the speaker via email!

John Sheppard on BBC 3

You may listen to the Sunday, February 28 BBC3 Early Music Program on-line here for the next 27 or so days. The subject is John Sheppard:

No-one knows for sure the birth-date of Tudor composer John Sheppard, but it is thought to have been around 600 years ago in 1515-16. Lucie Skeaping is joined by singer and musicologist Sally Dunkley to explore the life and work of one of England's finest composers, with performances by The Sixteen, The Tallis Scholars, Stile Antico, the Gabrieli Consort, The Clerkes of Oxenford and the Choir of Westminster Abbey.

John Sheppard: Libera nos I
The Sixteen
Harry Christophers (director)

John Sheppard: Verbum caro (excerpt)
The Clerkes of Oxenford
David Wulstan (director)

John Sheppard: The Lord's Prayer
Stile Antico

John Sheppard: Magnificat (from Second Service)
The Choir of Westminster Abbey
James O'Donnell (director)

John Sheppard: Agnus Dei (from Missa Cantate)
Gabrieli Consort
Paul McCreesh (director)

John Sheppard: Libera nos II
The Sixteen
Harry Christophers (director)

John Sheppard: Media vita
The Tallis Scholars
Peter Phillips (director).

Stile Antico explored his works on one of their CDs, too:

Winner of the Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik, Stile Antico’s fourth recording is entirely devoted to the remarkable music of John Sheppard. Once overshadowed by his illustrious contemporary Thomas Tallis, Sheppard is now recognised as a composer of extraordinary originality. The disc explores his achievement in wide range of forms, from enchanting English miniatures written during the Protestant reign of Edward VI to great Latin hymns, antiphons and responsories – chief amongst them the outstanding Media vita, one of the longest and most emotionally involving works of the entire Renaissance.

William Cornysh and Our Sorrowful Mother

That's not William Cornysh on the cover of The Tallis Scholars CD of music by William Cornysh: that's King Henry VII. Cornysh the younger's music--and possibly that of his father of the same name, who died in 1502--is one of the highlights of what remains of the Eton Choirbook. The  younger Cornysh was employed by Henry VII and continued to serve as musician and composer for Henry VIII. According to the notes for this 1988 CD:

William Cornysh (d.1523) lived at a crucial moment in the development of English music. On the one hand he contributed to the last and most florid style to be found in the Eton Choirbook; and on the other he must have realised that this style could go no further, beginning to simplify his music and thus setting a technique for the future. There is therefore considerable variety in his small output and this recording, which contains all the sacred music by him which may be reconstructed and a selection of his secular compositions, reflects it: from the unparalleled complexities of the last phrases of the Magnificat to the naive directness of Ah, Robin.

Cornysh was an early and rare example of what is now called the Renaissance artist. A man of remarkable intelligence, he was well-known in his lifetime not only as an outstanding musician, but also as a poet, dramatist and actor. Unfortunately none of his dramatic writings has survived, though there is a poem by him in the British Library entitled A Treatise bitwene Trouth and Enformacion which was written while serving a jail sentence in the Fleet prison. In this he claimed that he had been convicted by false information and thus wrongfully accused, though it is not known exactly what the accusation was. As an actor he took part in many plays at court, some of which have survived, including The Golden Arbour (1511) and the Triumph of Love and Beauty (1514). But it was within the activities of the court masque that he would have had the ideal opportunity to show off his many talents. In 1501 he is reported as having devised the pageants and 'disguysings' for the marriage festivities of Arthur, Prince of Wales and Katherine of Aragon. More importantly, in June 1520 he led the Chapel Royal's ceremonies at the Field of the Cloth of Gold, which included not only singing but a full-scale pageant. In 1522 the Emperor Charles V visited England to negotiate with Henry VIII and on June 15 the court was entertained with a play by Cornysh which outlined in simple allegory the progress of the discussions and their expected outcome.

This BBC page holds that the father may have written the works in the Eton Choirbook, since the son was better known for Courtly masques and entertainments--but he was Master of the Children of the Chapel Royal for many years. On this Holy Saturday, however, what I am most interested in is the Stabat Mater, the title of the CD and the last work on the CD:

The Stabat mater is a masterpiece which contains frequent contrasts between ornate and simpler passages: these juxtapositions are something of a speciality of Cornysh's. That this setting is less well-known might be because the opening sections survive incomplete, though these have been magnificently reconstructed by Professor Frank Harrison. In general Cornysh's style is less introverted than that of his greatest contemporary John Browne. Cornysh always seemed to be striving for the most brilliant effect, or the most pathetic tone, a way of thinking which would have made him perfectly suited to the madrigal a hundred years later, and makes him reminiscent of Thomas Weelkes.

Cornysh is also the composer of Woefully Arrayed, performed here by Stile Antico, from their 2012 CD Passion and Resurrection:

Gimell Records even has a vinyl recording of the Tallis Scholars' CD of Cornysh music available--carefully preserved from the 20th century.