Renaissance Singers at Ingatestone Hall: Saturday 21 October 2023

 Book quickly if you want to attend one of these Concerts to be held at Ingatestone Hall: The Renaissance Singers - specialist London chamber choir

Byrd Bike Ride

Members of Ingatestone Pedallers social cycling group called in at Stondon Massey Church last Sunday (2 July) in celebration of William Byrd. 

The 'William Byrd Fantasia' cycle ride was created a few years ago by local historian Robert Fletcher visiting two places strongly associated with the great composer: Ingatestone Hall, the home of the Petre family, and the churchyard at Stondon Massey, where Byrd is believed to have been buried in 1623. 

The 16-mile route passes Stondon Place, Byrd's home, and calls in at Byrd Mead near the Bricklayers Arms which are council homes for elderly residents built in 1985.

The group was shown around the church and viewed Byrd's Will and engraving which hang in the Vestry.

BCP Evensong - "A Vote of Thanks"

 

Centre: Lord Petre, Martin Stuchfield Deputy Lord Lieutenant of Essex, and Revd. Sam Brazier Gibbs Vicar of Stondon Massey following the special service to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the death of William Byrd.

A Vote of Thanks (concluding the Service).

"Lords, Ladies and Gentlemen. Thank you for coming today - and thank you to the Stondon Singers for performing some of William Byrd's greatest hits.

"As a Byrd nerd if I was exiled to a desert island with eight Byrd records and could save only one it would be the 'Agnus Dei' from the Four Part Mass. The final words "Dona nobis pacem" - "grant us peace" invoke the pain of persecution which rescusants faced and a plea for peace in an uncertain time.  The music is timeless.

"Byrd composed the Four Part Mass in 1592, and two other settings in 1595 - and they were sung illegally in Catholic households such as the Petre family of Ingatestone Hall where they may have been used for the first time.

"After three centuries of Catholic suppression following the Gunpowder Plot of 1605 Byrd's work is better known now than it was a hundred years ago when the memorial which you see to the Tercentenary was erected.

"Byrd was a keen musician, tutor and composer. These were his gifts.

"He was also a man of great faith at a time when his beliefs and traditions were suppressed.

"Byrd though composed not only religious music but for a variety of settings: songs, sonnets, and keyboard work.  In the preface of his 1588 'Psalmes and Songs of sadnes and piety' he wrote, "Since singing is so good a thing I wish all men [and women] would learn to sing".

"I hope that you will wish to learn more about this great composer.  Please buy a book to support the church's project. I this way you will be killing to Byrds with one stone."

'William Byrd 400 - Fantasia' Cycle Ride

 

On Sunday morning, 2 July, we will be welcoming to St Peter & St Paul Church Stondon Massey a group of cyclists from Ingatestone as they celebrate William Byrd.  The church will be open to visitors from about 11.00am to noon.

Hello Lincoln!

 Lincoln Cathedral celebrates the life and work of William Byrd in a sequence of concerts and lectures between 30 June and 4 July 2023.  The highlight will be the unveiling of a memorial to the great composer.

Byrd 400: celebrating our great choral composer - Lincoln Cathedral

William Byrd was Master of the Choristers at the cathedral from 1563 to 1672, during which time he composed much music for the relatively newly translated services of the Church of England. Byrd married a local woman, and his family grew during the time that he lived in Minster Yard.  At a time when failing to follow wholeheartedly the practice of the Church of England was seen as a treason, Byrd was stubbornly Catholic and made no attempts to hide it. His wife and other members of his household were arrested several times for recusancy (failing to give up their Catholic practices), and later in life Byrd himself was placed under house arrest in 1585. However, the appreciation of his musical talent by Queen Elizabeth led to the dropping of any charges ‘by order of the queen.’

Leaving Lincoln to become a Gentleman of the Chapel Royal in 1572, Byrd’s grew in reputation and fame until his retirement to Essex where he died on 4th July 1623.  On the day of his death, an entry in the chequebook of the Chapel Royal described him as “Wm. Bird, a Father of Musick.”

'The Life and Times of William Byrd. A Local History'. Friday 30 June 2023, 7.30pm

 

Tickets for our local celebration of William Byrd are for sale here: Fri. 30 June: 7.30-9.30pm The Life and Times of William Byrd: A Local Histo Tickets, Fri 30 Jun 2023 at 19:30 | Eventbrite 

Final preparations are under way for the talk on William Byrd at St Peter & St Paul Church, Stondon Massey, CM15 0LD. Book covers are printed with content to be run off and stapled in readiness for the evening which is a talk on the composer's life and times.  It will include the voices of the former Rector and historian of Stondon, the churchwarden, Jesuit priests and William Byrd himself all played by local members of our benefice. 

We are looking forward to meeting you too and hope you will join us in interval refreshments, buy a book, and contribute towards our planned project to commemorate Byrd in his 400th year - of which more about later. (We have a plaque inside the Church marking the Tercentenary.)

Westminster Cathedral Choir Visit

 Choristers from Westminster Cathedral made a private visit last Tuesday to Stondon Massey Church prior to a singing engagement at Brentwood Cathedral. The members saw the place where William Byrd refused to attend worship and were photographed with a copy of his framed Will taken from the Vestry. They also sang exclusively to the pleasure of our Licensed Lay Minister and Churchwarden.

Byrd Spotting. Some Local Events

Felicitas under their musical director Simon Walters have a concert at St John's Church Epping on Saturday 11 March beginning at 4.00pm. Called 'Heavenly Sounds' there will be a complete performance of Byrd's 'Mass for Five Voices'.

Stondon Singers hold their final concert before the big one on Saturday 18 March starting at 7.30pm at St Michael and All Angels Church, Galleywood. Hilary Punnet is their conductor and within the programme entitled 'Songs of Farewell' there is a piece by Byrd. 'Come to me grief forever' is from his 1588 collection of 'Psalmes, Sonets, & songs of sadne and pietie'. It is a funeral song for Sir Phillip Sidney and in this performance will be accompanied by Essex Viols.

New Recording of 'Great Service' by The Cardinall's Musick

In July 1923, as part of the London celebrations commemorating the Tercentenary of the death of William Byrd, an audience heard the first performance for some considerable time of the composer’s ‘Great Service’ at Westminster Abbey in the context of Evensong.  The manuscript had been found the previous year in the Library of Durham Cathedral by Edmund Fellowes who at the time was researching the music of Orlando Gibbons.  Fellowes later became Byrd’s biographer.  One of the people attending the London event was Canon Reeve of Stondon Massey, who knew Fellowes well and was instrumental in the commemoration of Byrd at Stondon Massey Church by way of a Memorial Tablet on the south wall.  Reeve described the Great Service as a “glorious effect produced by the 200 trained voices as the melodies floated around the pillars and arcades of the sacred building”. 

The ‘Great Service’ is so named because of its length and size in terms of choral parts.  It is set for two choirs of five voices.  There are seven “movements”, which are settings for Morning and Evening Prayer as well as the Communion Service.  It was one of very few works Byrd composed in English for the Reformed (Anglican) Church.  It was never published during his lifetime.

Joining the list of recordings of the work is one by The Cardinall’s Musick under their director Andrew Carwood.  (Available on Hyperion Records from 1 October 2012: CDA67937.)  It was a work sung at the opening concert of their ‘Byrd Tour’ at the Wigmore Hall in March.  Those who attended two successful concerts at St Peter & St Paul Church Stondon Massey on 2 September were able to purchase “advance” copies.

To my knowledge there are five recordings of the Great Service available.  I own three, so in ‘Building A Library’ fashion I listened to all movements back to back.  (I must add that I am not in any way a musician but like Byrd’s work, and so my view is one based on the enjoyment.)  The two discs not in my collection are by The Tallis Scholars under Peter Phillips (2001) and a very recent offering (June 2012) by Musica Contexta on Chandos records complete with sackbuts and cornets.  Having listened to clips of the recording on Amazon I am not convinced about the interpretation.  Maybe I am a purist preferring those with organ accompaniment.

My three contenders are:

The Choir of Westminster Abbey directed by James O’Donnell (Hyperion CDA67533, released 2005).

The Choir of King’s College, Cambridge, directed by Stephen Cleobury (EMI Digital CDC 7 47771 2, released 1987).

The Cardinall’s Musick directed by Andrew Carwood (Hyperion CDA67937, to be released 1.10.12).

The King’s version comprises two trebles, three altos, three tenors and two basses.  Listening to the opening ‘Venite’ you are struck that this is a quieter, perhaps more introspective performance than the others and is presented in the Evening Service portion of the disc as a Service for Ascension Day.  The presentation is a little sweet for my liking, perhaps hesitant.  The ‘Magnificat’ is not the slowest of the three recordings but seems to come to a halt at a point just before midway, before continuing … “and the rich he hath sent empty away” seemed desolate; then another pause.  The ‘Nunc Dimittis’ is a little disappointing.  It’s pleasant enough but the diction is not as clear as the others so maybe the dynamic sound Byrd envisaged is a little lost.

The Westminster Abbey recording has a richer sound with organ accompaniment by Robert Quinney.  (Andrew Carwood writes the notes in the booklet.)  This is a lovely recording.  The final words of the ‘Benedictus’, “Glory be to the Father … “ and the ‘Kyrie’ are sung with real conviction.  The trebles give their all in the ‘Creed’, perhaps a little too much.  Byrd’s musicianship can be heard in the line of the ‘Magnificat’ with everyone taking a turn singing “all generations shall call me blessed” – related and inclusive.  When the “rich are sent empty away” we are reminded more in voice of the link with the preceding lines about the good things they have missed.  The disc’s layout is again in two parts – Matins and Evensong – with anthems framing the main work.  These days, of course, we can select individual tracks at will.  It’s a nice recording and recommended if you believe that only male voices should sing Byrd.

The Cardinall’s Musick is a quite different offering: profound.  From the off you are aware of the voices blended in ‘O Come, let us sing unto the Lord’, but equally the sum of the individual parts.  The organist, again Robert Quinney, provides a supporting accompaniment which is never intrusive.  If Andrew Carwood’s theory is right that Byrd intended the Great Service as a farewell piece to his friends at the Chapel Royal (according to the notes in the booklet), then you can understand through this recording how interaction between each of the singers work.  Is there a choral parallel with Ralph Vaughan Williams’ ‘Serenade to Music’, specifically written with sixteen leading British soloists in mind?  Mozart wrote Horn Concertos for his friend.  So is it not fanciful to suggest Byrd did the same for his friends?  Trebles in this recording are replaced by sopranos.  But if there is any notion that this is a less spiritual presentation because it is by an ensemble rather than a cathedral choir, think again.  The shortest movement, ‘Kyrie’ is beautiful and the most penitential of all three recordings (perhaps because it is the most expansive at 1’12 rather than 1’01 – a photo finish – for both of the other recordings).  The sound is very clear and listeners don’t need the text in the booklet to hear the words.  The crafting of the words “… according to the scriptures …“in the Creed is sublime.  Then the Evening Service starts with “My soul doth magnify the Lord” in rapturous joy.  A magnificent ‘Magnificat’: in the phrase “filled the humble with good things” – how good are the good things!  The words “... for my eyes have seen thy salvation” in the ‘Nunc Dimittis’ with the rising notes of “eyes” seems to lift the voice to heaven.  The five anthems at the end of the programme are hardly fillers.  Turn this up in your living room!  If this doesn’t win a Gramophone Award I’ll eat my Hymn Book!

King’s College / Cleobury:  ***

Westminster Abbey / O’Donnell: ****

Cardinall’s Musick / Carwood:  *******

Cardinall's Musick at Stondon: 2 September 2012

The Cardinall's Musick

coming to Stondon Massey

where William Byrd lived until 1623

BBC Music Magazine feature Cardinall's Musick

Renaissance sacred choral music is the theme of the BBC Music Magazine cover disc for April 2012 (published today).  Cardinall’s Musick, under the direction of Andrew Carwood, sing works by Byrd and Tallis recorded at the Kilkenny Arts Festival (August 2010) and St John’s College, Cambridge (June 2011).  Highlight works by Byrd are ‘Infelix ego’ and ‘Iustorum animae’ (perhaps misspelt on other discs with a letter ‘J’ for ‘Justorum’ – I learned recently that the letter ‘J’ does not exist in the23-letter Latin alphabet).

The disc also mentions the group’s celebration of Byrd’s Latin music throughout 2012 in a series of concerts “that takes in a series of venues and historical locations linked to the great English composer”.  This includes Stondon Massey Church in Essex on Sunday 2 September.  There is an advertisement on page 113 listing the entire ‘Byrd Tour 2012’ giving website connections for each place.

If you are interested in tickets for St Peter and St Paul Church – there are only 70 available per performance – or would like further information, please e mail. 

Cardinall's Musick to perform Byrd at Stondon Massey

The multi-Gramophone Award winning Choir the Cardinall’s Musick will be coming to St Peter and St Paul Church Stondon Massey on Sunday 2 September to perform two short concerts as part of their Byrd Tour 2012. 

Cardinall’s Musick is an internationally recognised Choir specialising in early music.  In 2010, under the direction of Andrew Carwood, the singers released their 13^th disc concluding the complete Latin choral works of William Byrd.  ‘Infelix Ego’ won them the Recording of the Year. 

The Byrd Tour 2012 celebrates the recording achievement by taking the music of the great Elizabethan composer to venues both great and small.  St Peter and St Paul Church, the only stop planned in Essex, is one of the smallest on the tour but has such a strong association with Byrd that Andrew Carwood felt that the opportunity to perform here should not be missed.  The tour will be extensively advertised by Cardinall’s Musick in national newspapers and the music press.  The Choir can be heard on the cover CD of the BBC Music Magazine soon.

Members of Stondon’s congregation will be there on the day to supervise car parking, provide front of house support and post-concert refreshments.  The professional Choir will be offering tickets for sale online for about £10 for each of the two concerts.  (However please indicate to us now whether you are interested so that we can seek to secure tickets for sale locally).

Provisional times for the concerts are 3.00pm and 5.30pm on Sunday 2 September 2012.  Each hour-long offering will include motets by Byrd.

Contact us for further information.

Notes:

The Financial Times carried an interesting article giving information on Byrd and heralding the Byrd Tour 2012, which begins at the Wigmore Hall in London on Monday 5 March: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/73e967be-597c-11e1-abf1-00144feabdc0.html#axzz1nN4pStYi . For the latest tour information go to http://www.cardinallsmusick.com/news/byrd-tour-2012 and specifically, for Stondon Massey Essex, follow the link to the William Byrd Festival blog, http://www.williambyrdfestival.blogspot.com/ .

Reeve Family Archive to go on display

Books, manuscripts and documents relating to a Victorian Rector and his family will go on display for the first time at Stondon Massey on Saturday 15 October.

The archive highlights the life and times of a well-to-do family from the Essex / Suffolk border.  

Edward Reeve (1785-1867) served in the West Suffolk Militia before purchasing Stondon Massey Rectory in 1849 for his clergyman son and moving himself and his family into comfortable retirement.  Among the items on display at St Peter & St Paul Church will be his commonplace book written in the last years of his life and another manuscript of 'Jottings' written in 1881 by his grandson, Lisle.  Edward Henry Lisle Reeve, the subject of a recent biography, was born in the village and was the Rector of Stondon Massey, succeeding his father, from 1893 to 1935.  He died 75 years ago this year. 'Jottings' is a combination of family history and stories, told presumably after dinner. It is a fascinating social history about the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century.  Reeve's cycling trophy (dated 1880) and photograph can also be seen. A Book of Common Prayer, dated 1817, will be on display which contains prayers associated with the Gunpowder Plot and the Martyrdom of King Charles I.

Canon Reeve is credited by many for bringing William Byrd to local public attention during his incumbency in the early twentieth century.

The archive is a generous donation by descendants of the family. 

Visitors will be able to purchase for the first time three booklets transcribing extracts from the commonplace books.  Also available will be the recently published biography and 'William Byrd Some Notes'. Booklets are £2 each and support the upkeep of the church and churchyard.

St Peter & St Paul Church will be open on Saturday 15 October 2011 from 10.00am to 3.00pm.  Refreshments will also be available on what will be the church's annual Gift Day.

Byrd in America

The 14th William Byrd Festival begins in Portland, Oregon today (technically tomorrow if you are in England).  For more information visit www.byrdfestival.org . We would love to hear from anyone who is attending the three-weekend event.

Stondon Singers: William Byrd Anniversary Concert

Tuesday 5 July. 8pm.  St Peter & St Paul Church, Stondon Massey, Essex. CM15 0LD.
Tickets will be available on the door.

Byrd is now on Twitter

In addition to this site we have opened a Twitter account.
User name: Stondon Massey.
Account: @WilliamByrd1623.  

Stondon Singers Concert Previewed on Phoenix FM

Michael Aves, Chairman, composer, and singer in the Stondon Singers spoke to Ed Wellman yesterday morning on Phoenix FM about the forthcoming 'William Byrd Anniversary Concert' at St Peter & St Paul Church, Stondon Massey on Tuesday 5th July. Michael has composed a piece commemorating the 400th anniversary of publication of the King James' Bible. The Concert also includes a piece by Byrd's Spanish contemporary, Victoria. Hear the interview here.

http://www.phoenixfm.com/2011/06/26/sunday-breakfast-26th-june/

Stondon Singers: William Byrd Anniversary Concert

Something of an annual, and much anticipated, event for Stondon Massey is the concert given by the Stondon Singers in memory of William Byrd, the great early music composer who died on 4 July 1623 in the Essex village. This year it will be held on Tuesday 5 July beginning at 8.00pm.

The Singers secretary writes: “We have decided to move away from the term Memorial concert to the more 'upbeat' Anniversary concert, but the underlying principle, celebrating the music of Byrd, remains the same”.

This year the concert will feature music from Tomas Luis de Victoria, who died in Madrid in 1611. The Spanish composer has a striking similarity with Byrd in that Vittoria (as his name is sometimes spelt) wrote only church music including a complete cycle of hymns for the Roman Catholic liturgical year.

The Stondon Singers return to the lovely little church of St Peter & St Paul, Stondon Massey, following their successful performance at the William Byrd Festival, for their annual celebration of the work of William Byrd and his contemporaries, and his lasting legacy into the present day.

Featured alongside works by William Byrd himself, the highlight of this year’s concert is one of the finest masses by Byrd’s contemporary, Victoria, whose ‘Missa Vidi Speciosam’ forms the central work of the first half.

Also in the concert are madrigals from the same period and contrasting works from later centuries, including an ‘Ave Maria’ by Stravinsky, works by Gabriel Jackson and Imogen Holst, plus a new anthem written specially for the Singers by Michael Aves, celebrating the 400^th anniversary of the King James Bible.

Tickets for the concert cost £12 (£10 for concessions and £5 for children aged 15 and under) and are available from James Dace & Son (Chelmsford), Blackmore Post Office or any choir member. Also on the door on the night, although advance purchase is recommended

The Programme includes:

Victoria: Missa Vidi Speciosam.

Byrd: Sing Joyfully, Ave Maria, Virga Jesse Floruit, This Sweet and Merry Month, Though Amaryllis Dance in Green.

G Jackson: O Sacrum Convivium

I Holst: The Virgin Unspotted, The Twelve Kindly Months, Gypsy Davy

Festival Highlighted in Exeter

Luch Càise-Dearg has been following with interest the William Byrd Festival here in Essex. The Exeter community station, Phonic FM, broadcasts a programme of classical music, moving from early to modern, almost every Tuesday morning from 10.00am to noon. It called appropriately ‘Classical Journey’. At the top of both shows 10 & 17 May our great composer has been featured with the playlist on the show’s blog. For more see http://classicaljourneyphonic.blogspot.com/2011/05/classical-journey-tuesday-10-may.html and http://classicaljourneyphonic.blogspot.com/2011/05/classical-journey-tuesday-17-may.html

For more about Phonic FM visit http://www.phonic.fm/2009/03/16/classical-journey/

We love the cute picture!

William Byrd Festival Gains International Reputation: Press Release

Stondon Massey’s tribute to the Elizabethan composer, William Byrd, culminated last weekend with a concert by the Writtle Singers (photographed) at St Peter and St Paul Church (Saturday) and service of favourite hymns (Sunday).

The William Byrd Festival was organised by members of the congregation in order to raise money in support of the building of a new Garden of Remembrance in the churchyard where Byrd is believed to have been buried in an unmarked grave in 1623.

Last week one of the congregation visited the church in order to set up the space for a choir rehearsal to find affixed to the door a bunch of flowers with a request to place them on the grave of the ‘English composer’. The flowers were sent by well-wishers from ‘Tom Garrison and the Trinity Choir’ which following a little Internet research turned out to be the Episcopal Cathedral in Kansas City over in the United States of America.

Festival Organiser, Andrew Smith, said, “This was a lovely surprise. We were not able to place the flowers on an unmarked grave so instead decided to arrange them on the Memorial Tablet to the great composer inside the church. Our Festival website (www.williambyrdfestival.blogspot.com) shows that William Byrd is very popular in America with over a third of the hits coming from that country. We have received goodwill messages from many and some lovely comments on the singers who appeared at the Festival”.

“The William Byrd Festival has been a tremendous success, both in raising Byrd’s profile and financially. We have raised £2200 toward the Garden of Remembrance project”.