Songs From a Divine Pen

Music by Thomas Tallis & William Byrd for voices and viols.

The internationally acclaimed Rose Consort of Viols is joined by Nova, Bristol’s specialist early music vocal ensemble, in works for viols and voices from the 1575 Cantiones, quae ab argumento sacrae vocantur, published by Tallis and his younger protégé Byrd to promote their own music.

The collection’s flamboyant prefatory poem refers to the scandal that music by foreign composers is widely published. But not until this, the first printed collection of Latin sacred music by English composers, has England been able to boast composers of the stature of Lassus, Gombert, Clemens and Ferrabosco, whose music we also hear in tonight’s programme.