The English Anthem: from Byrd to Boyce
The English Anthem: from Byrd to Boyce
VOCES
Director: Martyn Warren
Organ: Jonathan Watts
Saturday 23 May 2009
St Mary’s Totnes, 7.30pm
CD 1
1. When rising from the bed of deathThomas Tallis (c.1505-1585)
2. My trust O Lord Christopher Tye (c.1500-1573)
3. Ah, helpless wretch1William Mundy (c.1529-c.1591)
4. Come let us rejoiceWilliam Byrd (c.1540-1623)
5. Lord, let me know mine end2Maurice Greene (c.1655-1785)
6. Sonata in C for organFelix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy (1809-1847)
7. How long wilt thou forget me?3Jeremiah Clarke (c.1673-1707)
8. When David heard that Absalon was slain Michael East (c.1580-1648)
9. I have surely built thee an house4William Boyce (1711-1779)
CD 2
1. Call to remembranceRichard Farrant (d.1581)
2. Let thy merciful ears, O LordMudd (16th C)
3. This is the record of John5Orlando Gibbons (1583-1625)
4. Since God so tender a regard6Henry Purcell (1659-1695)
5. Christ rising again from the dead4Thomas Tomkins (1572-1656)
6-7. Voluntary VIII in d minor (organ)John Stanley (1713-1786)
8. Rejoice in the Lord alwayAnon. (mid-16th C)
9. Almighty God, the fountain of all wisdomThomas Tomkins (1572-1656)
10. Rejoice in the Lord alway4Henry Purcell (1659-1695)
The singers
Soprano: Josie Carpenter2, Helen Cross, Nini Davies, Louise Hardy3, Penny Johnson, Louise Knightley, Alicia Stolliday2, Stella Westwell.
Alto: Rachel Howells1, Diana Nightingale, Margaret Thomson, Martyn Warren4.
Tenor: Peter Beamish6, Jason Bomford, Jonathan Harris4,5, Peter Miller6.
Bass: Robert Martin4, Christopher Walledge6, Jonathan Watts
Numbers (e.g. 1) indicate soloists. In addition there were various soloists from the choir in ‘Christ rising again’.
The word ‘anthem’ has been in use, according to the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, since the 11th century, being ‘derived from and largely synonymous with antiphon’. Until the 16th century the term would merely a colloquial English term for a setting of Latin words to be sung in plainchant or in polyphony at Vespers, after Compline or at one of the other offices of the day in the Roman Catholic. It took on a new meaning with the advent of the Established protestant church, first at the accession of Edward VI, and then again, and more permanently, under Elizabeth I. Now it came to denote a musical setting of English words, usually from the Psalms but sometimes from the Book of Common Prayer, to be sung at Evensong or (less frequently) at Mattins in the Anglican Church.
Elizabeth’s long reign and patronage of music provided the conditions necessary for innovation and development. More to the point, this was an era (give or take and Armada or two) of relative peace between England and her European neighbours, allowing composers of ‘full’ anthems (those for chorus alone, often unaccompanied) to absorb new ideas in choral polyphony emanating from Rome, Munich, Dresden, and the like. At the same time new developments in use of instrumental accompaniment and solo-singing led to the emergence of the ‘verse anthem’, where attention is focussed on the soloist and instrumentalists (usually organ or viols) and the chorus is relegated to occasional interjections for commentary or emphasis. All, though, with the calm, languid air of the unflappable Englishman rather than the more flamboyant products of some of his more excitable continental cousins.
And so the pattern was established for at least the next 400 years of English church music, with parallel development of full and verse anthems (though the balance between the two would fluctuate in tune with fashions, finances and wars (not least the Civil War). In this concert we focus on the period up to the 1770’s, inspired by one of the heroes of English music, William Boyce. Not only was he a fine composer, but in 1773 he published a three-volume collection of anthems and services going back to Tudor times, titled simply ‘Cathedral Music’. He was not the initiator of the venture – that was his erstwhile tutor Maurice Greene, who on inheriting an estate from an illegitimate cousin, ‘meditated on the corruptions of our church-music, occasioned by the multiplication of copies, and the ignorance and carelessness of transcribers; and resolved to correct, and also to secure it against such injuries for the future’. But it was Boyce who, after Greene’s death, completed the venture, and in doing so created a wonderful and long-lasting resource for performers and scholars. I have not stuck slavishly to Boyce’s selection, but he remains the inspiration, and is aptly represented in this programme by his verse-anthem ‘I have surely built thee an house to live in’. What better salute to this church of St Mary, one of the finest in the West Country, and in whose honour we present our concert.
As a counterpoint to the choral items, Jonathan Watts will play a Voluntary by the blind composer John Stanley, a pupil of Maurice Greene, and the Sonata in C by Mendelssohn. The latter is out of our period, but in his centenary year, and with the fine 19th-century Father Willis organ to hand, it seems a pity to leave him out.
Martyn Warren