William Byrd
Gradualia (1607)
William ByrdÕs Gradualia (1607) have been placed Òamong the finest English
works of all time.Ó By employing the single voices envisioned by the
composer, our recording returns these virtuosic cries for justice and
freedom to the perilous context of the clandestine liturgies for which
they were composed. ByrdÕs musical rhetoric, a direct and sophisticated
response to the suffering of a people living and dying under a brutally
oppressive regime, is as searingly relevant today as it was when the works
were notated with ink that flowed as copiously as the Catholic martyrsÕ
blood ran within the walls of the Tower of London
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