Many listeners are aware that William Byrd's Latin religious works were often written for performance by so-called recusant Catholics, who refused to accept the state-mandated Anglican faith of Elizabethan England and maintained their faith, and their music, in small gatherings. Few performances, however, have asked what that might mean musically. That's what the Marian Consort and its director, Rory McCleery, do here. The small-group performance of Renaissance music is generally questionable inasmuch as groups like the ...
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Many listeners are aware that William Byrd's Latin religious works were often written for performance by so-called recusant Catholics, who refused to accept the state-mandated Anglican faith of Elizabethan England and maintained their faith, and their music, in small gatherings. Few performances, however, have asked what that might mean musically. That's what the Marian Consort and its director, Rory McCleery, do here. The small-group performance of Renaissance music is generally questionable inasmuch as groups like the Sistine Chapel Choir often had two dozen singers or more. Here, though, it's just right: Byrd was writing intimate, deeply philosophical music for household chamber performance. The Marian Consort for this performance is a group of eight. They all sing in Byrd's Mass for four voices, deploying two voices per part and letting the individual voices show through rather than making them blend. The program is set up in the way that a Renaissance mass would have been performed, with the...
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