In a lecture on Saturday, Byrd’s Music at the Turn of the Twentieth Century, Dr. William Mahrt pointed out that the William Byrd Festival entered its 25th year this August. The first festival in the world dedicated to this composer (though now there are others), it has now performed all of the Latin works from the great English composer’s oeuvre; this year marked the first year of its inclusion of works by 20th century British composers.
The concert on August 10th at St. Michaels and All Angels Episcopal Church (with a stack of silvery organ pipes whose shaping somehow vaguely reminded me of the Hallgrímskirja in Reykjavik) provided an intimate setting for an interesting project, which was the setting to Byrd’s music some poems from the Arcadia by the renowned Elizabethan courtier-poet Sir Philip Sidney. Ross W. Duffin, who devised this idea, explained that these poems, which were likely meant to be sung, were originally nested in a prose story. Duffin was on hand to explain about the works and about Sidney. Considered to be the greatest sonneteer after Shakespeare, he also wrote much prose and poetry before dying at the age of 31 from a gruesome, gangrenous wound suffered in some forgotten battle of the Eighty Years War.
Set in a mythical, bucolic paradise, the Arcadia was full of gender-bending, hidden identities, and whatnot, but the plot seemed to mean little by way of understanding these individual songs in and of themselves. The songs were typically short, with very little in the way of da capo repetition.
The opening piece was an a cappella work by Byrd, featuring Vakarė Petroliūnaitė, Kerry McCarthy, Michael Hilton, John Cox, and Benjamin España. O you that hear this voice was a confusing, delicious cascade of exceedingly dense polyphonic lines that came together suddenly and sweetly, mellifluous like ice cream melting in the summer heat. Hilton was joined by keyboardist Mark Williams (spinet), who played Byrd’s keyboard works as the singers sang Sidney’s poems set by Duffin. Hilton’s tenor was rich and round, fulsome and not piercing. Though I’m no expert on Renaissance singing, Hilton’s singing came through as authentic and historically informed, as did all the singers. Petroliūnaitė’s soprano was possessed of a very strong lower register, while McCarthy’s alto was reminiscent of a warm double-reed instrument. España’s delightfully deft ornamentation in The Merchant Man, whom gayne dothe teache, was a master class: ornate, imaginative, detailed, and yet never forced, never a detriment to the flow of the music itself. All singers had incredibly nuanced dynamic control–hairpins on short words were commonplace, a technique that filled the structure with emotional color. Williams played a Byrd lute transcription on the spinet—sere yet interesting, it ended with that delightful Renaissance about-face, the Picardy third.
Set me as a seal upon thine heart
The following day at the Anglican Parish of St. Mark’s in NW Portland, a brick Romanesque church nigh on a century old, I showed up in the sweltering afternoon for the Choral Evensong worship service. A uniquely Anglican service roughly analogous to Catholic Vespers, the text is taken from the Book of Common Prayer.
The choir was Cantores in Ecclesia, a master choir now nearly in its 40th year since its inception under one director, Dean Applegate (read more in Daryl Browne’s preview of this year’s festival). They specialize in Gregorian Chant and sacred polyphonic music, from the middle ages up to and including the magnificent works from the 20th century British choral tradition–numerous composers of which were featured this night, including William Walton, David Trendell and Grayston Ives, among others. In short, this is a group of some of the very best singers in the area, whose specialty and mission is combining worship and vocal music, and their expertise always shines.
Set me as a Seal by William Walton was the Introit. Beautiful poetry: “Set me as a seal upon thine heart…for love is strong as death.” Tight, close 20th century harmonies rang from the red brick nave. Psalm 101, as set by Thomas Attwood Walmisley, moved in lush block chords, always unforced and warm, the voices sounding like a human pipe organ.
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Byrd’s Magnificat fit perfectly with the Romanesque architecture. There were echoes and repetitions, staggered entrances and wandering lines, and then Cantores came suddenly together in bold unisons, debouching from the thinner texture of the polyphony like a great cataract squeezed by rocks and bursting forth into a great sunlit plain. Every soloist was top-notch, confident, and yet cognizant of being part of the ensemble. It was a joy to hear such pure voices, judicious vibrato used sparingly used if at all, standing out briefly and then standing back down, out of the way of the ceaselessly moving voices and ever-shifting harmonies.
The Anthem, by William Harris, featured a mighty crescendo from the sopranos, welling up fearful and full of mystery; darkness is denied entrance but one feels its presence, nonetheless. Immense, bold chords that I’m pretty sure had some 9ths and 13ths in them somewhere; a radiant ‘amen’ formed like a halo over the closing of the work.
Though he was a crypto-Catholic in a time and place where it was dangerous to be so, Byrd’s celebrity and genius seemed to give him some protection; with talent such as his, and a position at court in the Chapel Royal, his light could in no way be kept under a bushel. Dr. Mahrt quoted Byrd: though Byrd was speaking of his own music in the preface to his mighty Gradualia, I would certainly apply it to all of the composers who were performed at the Choral Evensong concert:
“We have sung the praises of God and the citizens of heaven in such heavenly harmony as we can attain.”
Word.
