The Byrd Edition

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THE BYRD EDITION

The Byrd Edition was begun by Edmund Fellowes in 1937 and later revised under the direction of Thurston Dart.

All of the volumes in the new Byrd Edition, which is under the General Editorship of Philip Brett, are now available. Other works by William Byrd

Most Recent Volume: Volume 13 - April 2005
Series Complete - No further volumes due for publication.

NEW!! Almost every work found in these volumes (over 430 titles) is now available for sale as an Adobe PDF file for delivery to your inbox. See www.byrdedition.com for full details.

Volume 1: Cantiones Sacrae (1575)
Edited by Craig Monson
Lavishly produced, the 1575 Cantiones, quae ab argumento sacrae vocantur by Byrd and Tallis celebrated not only the composers’ acquisition of the royal patent for the printing and marketing of part-music and lined music paper, but also their mastery of the continental polyphonic style. Though the edition was only moderately successful, a number of Byrd’s 17 motets in 5 and 6 parts survived in manuscript sources until the Commonwealth period. Three motets were also adapted to English words.

Volume 2: Cantiones Sacrae I (1589)
Edited by Alan Brown
Byrd's 1589 Cantiones Sacrae consists of 16 5-voice 'sacred songs', as the composer called them. They were probably composed over a number of years before the collection was assembled. Though serious in mood, they were intended as vocal chamber music for domestic performance. H.K. Andrews described them as 'musically one of the great achievements of the century'.

Volume 3: Cantiones Sacrae II (1591)
Edited by Alan Brown
The Liber Secundus Sacrarum Cantionum appeared in November 1591, and was printed, like its predecessor, by Thomas East. Biblical and liturgical sources provided texts for its 21 motets, most of them sombre in tone. The noted scholar Joseph Kerman has observed that in these pieces, Byrd may have been voicing 'prayers, exhortations and protests on behalf of the English Roman Catholic community'.

Volume 4: The Masses
Edited by Philip Brett
Although Byrd’s Masses in three, four and five parts were published without title pages, they have now been established as dating from 1592-95, in the years immediately following his move to Standon Massey near Ingatestone in Essex, home of the Catholic Petre family. While their debt to English and continental models is fully explored in the preface to the volume, the Masses stand above all as reflections of Byrd’s mature style at its most refined and original.

Volume 5: Gradualia I (1605) - The Marian Masses
Edited by Philip Brett
As Byrd emphasised in his precise description of their contents, Gradualia is primarily a collection of pieces proper to the Mass and most of the chief feasts of the Roman Catholic calendar. This volume contains the first sections of Book 1, in which the composer attempted to cover all the occasions when a Marian Mass was required, either on feast days of the Virgin or for the customary Saturday observance of the Votive Mass.

Volume 6a: Gradualia I (1605) - All Saints and Corpus Christi
Edited by Philip Brett
In addition to All Saints Propers and antiphons and hymns for Corpus Christi and of the Blessed Sacrament, Volume 6a contains three non-liturgical pieces, Adoramus te Christe, Unam petii a Domino, and Plorans plorabit.

Volume 6b: Gradualia I (1605) - Other Feasts and Devotions
Edited by Philip Brett
The contents of the third volume devoted to Byrd’s 1605 collection represent the second half of its title, Gradualia ac Cantiones Sacrae. With one exception, the pieces are not 'graduals' or Propers of the Mass, but devotional works, probably intended for domestic use and reflecting the intense and all-embracing spirituality of Roman Catholic practice in Byrd's England.

Volume 7a: Gradualia II (1607) - Christmas to Easter
Edited by Philip Brett
It has been argued that the first book of Gradualia fulfilled Byrd's obligation to that part of the liturgy most crucial to the cause of recusants - and to the Jesuits with whom he was involved. With the second book, he presented music for the major festivals of the Christian life. More systematially planned than its predecessor, this collection presents the feasts in the order of the church year, beginning in December with Christmas.

Volume 7b: Gradualia II (1607) - Ascension, Pentecost and the Feasts of Saints Peter and Paul
Edited by Philip Brett
In addition to the propers and antiphons appropriate to the respective festivals of the church year, the second part of the 1607 Gradualia contains, it is thought, a hidden tribute: a set of Propers for the Feast of St. Peter’s Chains, perhaps celebrated on 1 August 1603 to commemorate, on 21 July of that year, the elevation to the peerage of Byrd's longstanding patron Sir John Petre.

Volume 8: Latin Motets I
Edited by Warwick Edwards
This volume is devoted to Byrd's Latin sacred works which have survived only in manuscript sources. Its contents range from those motets such as Alleluya. Confitemini Domino judged to be among the composer's earliest, to works of the 1560s - Ad Dominum cum tribularer for example - and two later cantus firmus respond motets that may also be dated to this period.

Volume 9: Latin Motets II
Edited by Warwick Edwards
Volume 9 completes the collection of Byrd's Latin sacred works from the late 1570s onwards preserved in manuscript alone. It includes Domine, exaudi orationem meam, which is published for the first time in fully reconstructed form. Philippe de Monte's partial Psalm 136 setting, Super flumina Babylonis, to which Byrd's Quomodo cantabimus (here appearing for the first time with text correctly underlaid) was a musical response, features in the appendices, together with the fragmentary Ad punctum in modico and a number of motets putatively ascribed to the composer, but judged unlikely to be by him.

Volume 10a: The English Services
Edited by Craig Monson
Byrd’s music for the Anglican service remains one of the least appreciated areas of his output. Its manner is generally restrained; its sources, for the most part, are problematical. Abjuring word painting and imitation, settings of the Preces and Responses, Psalms, Service and Litany rely on harmonic variety for their musical interest and continuity.

Volume 10b: The English Services II - (The Great Service)
Edited by Craig Monson
Since The Great Service was rediscovered in manuscripts at Durham, it has come to be recognised not only as Byrd's most important work for the Anglican church, but also as one of the masterpieces of Elizabethan art. In the hope of recapturing the composer’s intentions as nearly as possible, the present edition follows the scoring of pre-Restoration sources more precisely than did either Fellowes or Tudor Church Music, and restores the parts that have subsequently come to light.

Volume 11: The English Anthems
Edited by Craig Monson
The composition of Anglican church music was never one of Byrd's priorities, but his anthems on English texts remained in favour long after his death, and for two centuries were the works by which his name was remembered. Full and verse anthems are included in this volume, with anthems from secular sources and fragmentary and doubtful works also collected.

Volume 12: Psalmes, Sonets and Songs (1588)
Edited by Jeremy Smith
Only the third book of English songs ever known to have been published, Psalmes, Sonets & Songs appeared thirteen years after Byrd's first collaborative) venture into print with the Cantiones of 1575. In contrast to the earlier production, it was a considerable success, being reprinted several times. Its contents, consisting mainly of consort songs adapted for five voices, were perhaps intended to capitalise on the new vogue for the madrigal. Included in the prefatory matter are the composer’s well-known reasons for 'every one to learne to singe'. Two funeral songs of Sir Philip Sidney and the famous Lullaby, for which the collection acquired the title of 'Byrd's Lullaby', are to be found among the 35 songs.

Volume 13: Songs of Sundrie Natures (1589)
Edited by David Mateer
Published in 1589, following the successful issue of Psalmes, Sonets and Songs the previous year, Songs of Sundrie Natures is a more diverse collection than its predecessor. Though the contents include one consort song in its original form, they contain a relative dearth of adaptations of this genre for unaccompanied voices. In contrast, there is arguably a higher percentage of recently composed works and 'sundrie' material, including two carols, the very fine verse anthem Christ rising again, and two chanson-like pieces, Susanna fair and The Nightingale, probably written in 'friendly aemulation' with Ferrabosco.

Volume 14: Psalmes, Songs, and Sonnets
Edited by John Morehen
Byrd himself described his last publication, Psalmes, Songs and Sonnets of 1611 as his ultimum vale. Nonetheless, some of the music was written earlier, and compiled or adapted to complete this collection of 32 pieces in three, four, five and six parts. Five of the 3-part pieces are settings of texts from the first English emblem book, Geoffrey Whitney's A Choice of Emblems of 1586. Facsimiles of the relevant pages from Whitney are included.

Volume 15: Consort Songs for voice & viols
Edited by Philip Brett
The consort song was a genre that Byrd explored without serious disciples or artistic rivals in his time. Even so, his example in this form exercised a profound influence on later generations through its offshoot, the verse anthem. 41 songs are here grouped into four sections: Psalms and spiritual songs; moral songs and 'sonnets'; elegies; and later songs. Eight more doubtful or spurious compositions are contained in an appendix.

Volume 16: Madrigals, Songs and Canons
Edited by Philip Brett
Of madrigals and partsongs, Volume 16 of the Byrd Edition contains the six items not included in the printed sets of 1588, 1589 and 1611 (distinguished by the lack of obligatory instrumental accompaniments); of the consort songs, the original versions of consort songs that were subsequently arranged as madrigals; and of canons and rounds, the two that can without doubt be attributed to the composer.

Volume 17: Consort Music
Edited by Kenneth Elliott
Though Byrd's In nomine settings for consort were probably the first of his works to circulate widely, the dating of his consort music in general is problematical. The famous 'Browning' variations are probably an early display of the composer's mastery of the form. The only complete Fantasia à 4 is found in the Psalmes, Songs & Sonnets of 1611. Two other examples are reconstructed from fragmentary sources, and appear in this volume with hymn-settings and Misereres, two pavans and a galliard.

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