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‘Where were you on the 5th of November 1605, the day when the Gunpowder Plot came to light?’ We can imagine that question being asked of the five English-born composers represented on this disc who lived through that day; and it will be instructive to hear their (imagined) answers, for these five men represent a cross-section of religious views, Protestant and Roman Catholic, and they witnessed the day variously in England or abroad. For the sake of diplomacy, we will interrogate them in order of seniority. So, William Byrd, Peter Philips, John Dowland, Thomas Weelkes and Richard Dering: where were you on the day when the King’s men found Guy Fawkes and his barrels of gunpowder in the cellars below Parliament House, ready to obliterate not only King James I, his wife and their elder children, but also the entire nobility, senior clergy and judiciary of England? On the 5th of November 1605, William Byrd, aged about 62, was probably at home in Stondon Massey, deep in rural Essex. We can imagine him hearing the news with especial gravity, for he must have known some of the Plotters by name, if not in person. Although a senior member of the King’s Chapel Royal, Byrd was a Roman Catholic. Like the Plotters, he had watched with dismay as the penal laws against the Catholics were re-enacted, Jesuit priests banished from the land, and a peace treaty signed with Spain and Burgundy - lands to which the English Catholics had long turned for succour and support. Byrd was no latent terrorist, but he did play his part in voicing dissent, by writing and printing music that expressed the Catholic point of view. Earlier in life, he had composed motets using texts that were easily read as political statements about the Catholic situation. A few years before the Gunpowder Plot, he published three settings of the Mass, scored for three, four and five voices - an act so dangerous that the printer refused to put his name to them. Now, in 1605, Byrd had just seen through the press a sequel volume called Gradualia, the contents of which were again meant for clandestine celebrations of the Roman Catholic Mass. Not surprisingly, the authorities had their eye on William Byrd. For him, his family and their circle, news of the Gunpowder Plot will have come as a bitter blow, for it could spell only one thing: further penalties and persecution for those who, like them, chose quietly to profess a faith that was outlawed by the state. So close was Byrd to the crisis of 1605 that he has been made the protagonist in this recital of music and words. His voice is represented in two different ways. First, in Deborah Mackay's imaginary monologue (printed below), Byrd talks us through the events that led up to and followed the unmasking of the Gunpowder Plot. The narrative has been designed for listeners to read silently, as a way of framing the tracks on the disc. Secondly, Byrd’s beliefs and feelings are expressed through his music. Pride of place is given to his Mass for Four Voices, which is performed here as it would have been in Catholic households in Byrd’s day: by a handful of voices, sometimes supported by viols. The five-voice motet Civitas sancti tui, written around 1580, outwardly laments the destruction of Jerusalem, but it is clearly an allegory; the real subject here is the desecration of English Catholicism by the Protestant reformers. The keyboard piece called A Fancie, though seemingly religiously neutral, evidently draws some of its themes from one of the most famous plainchant melodies of the Roman rite, the ‘Salve Regina’. Only the Christmas consort song From Virgin’s womb finds its way into this recital for a non-Catholic reason. In some surviving copies of the piece, the words of the chorus (‘Rejoice, rejoice’) have been changed in order that they might allude to England's great ‘escape’ from the Gunpowder Plot. So much for William Byrd. What of the other four Englishmen represented on this disc? On the 5th of November 1605, Peter Philips, aged about 44, was in Brussels, attending Mass in the household chapel of Archduke Albert, Regent of the Spanish Netherlands. Like Byrd, Philips was a Roman Catholic, but he chose a different solution to the issue: in the 1580s he turned his back on England and went into exile abroad, living and working in places where he could follow his faith without threat. As the Gunpowder Plot took shape, Philips was a chaplain and organist at the archduke’s chapel. His reaction to the Plot is unknown, but we can sense his broad point of view in Ave Maria, gratia plena. First published in 1623, this six-voice motet is a model expression of Roman Catholic belief in the efficacy of prayer to the Blessed Virgin Mary. It closes with the words ‘Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and in the hour of our death’ - precisely the form of sentiment and belief that James I witheringly dismissed, a few years after the Gunpowder Plot, in his remark that ‘the Blessed Virgin probably had better things to do in heaven than to hear every idle man’s suit, or busy herself with their errands’. On the 5th of November 1605, John Dowland, aged 42, was in Denmark, playing the lute to King Christian IV and his court; and he must have been dismayed by the news of the Gunpowder Plot, for it had serious implications for his own future career. Earlier in life, Dowland had been allied with a group of English Catholics involved in treasonable activities. Thereafter, suspicion about him had persisted, notwithstanding his claim ‘never to have loved treason nor treachery, nor never heard any Mass in England’. In 1604 he had been in London, seeing through the press his Lachrimae or Seaven Teares, a collection of pieces for viols and lute; and the book had a specific aim. Dowland had long been trying to secure a salaried position at the English court, but without success. By dedicating Lachrimae to Anne of Denmark, Christian’s sister and James I’s new queen, Dowland not only offered further proof of his talent, but also reminded the English king and his wife of his availability. Hence his dismay on the 5th of November 1605: the Gunpowder Plot must have detonated those hopes for a post at the English court, precisely because of his previous links with Catholic dissidents. On this disc, Dowland’s voice is represented by three pieces from Lachrimae, the titles of which refer to men from different sides of the Protestant-Catholic divide. Sir Henry Umpton’s Funeral memorializes a staunch Protestant, Sir Henry Unton, who died in 1596. George Whitehead’s Almand connects instead with the Catholics: Whitehead belonged to the Duke of Northumberland’s household, and the Duke was subsequently found guilty of complicity in the Gunpowder Plot. As for M. Bucton’s Galliard, it can be viewed as an emblem of the covert and the unknown. Not only is the identity of ‘M. Bucton’ unclear; Dowland’s music is itself a cleverly camouflaged reworking of one of the most famous compositions of its age: Susanne un jour by Orlande de Lassus. On the 5th of November 1605, Thomas Weelkes was in Chichester on the south coast of England. His day is the easiest to for us to imagine. It began at home, where the 29-year-old musician had a young wife and a toddler son. It continued in Chichester Cathedral, where Weelkes was a singer, organist, and master of the choristers. It probably ended in a local ale-house, with a heated discussion of the breaking news. Weelkes had no known sympathies with the Catholics, and on this disc he stands as the staunchest representative of the Protestant point of view. His verse anthem O Lord, how joyful is the King was written in the wake of the Gunpowder Plot, apparently for use at annual services of thanksgiving for deliverance from the plot. (In some manuscript sources, the piece is headed with the words ‘for the fifth of November’.) Weelkes’ text is a verse paraphrase of Psalm 21, written fifty years earlier by Thomas Sternhold. Nonetheless, the words are astonishingly apt for the situation, and we can imagine James I listening with some satisfaction to one line in particular: ‘such mischief did they muse against thine holy name; yet did they fail’ As for the youngest of our five composers, Richard Dering, on the 5th of November 1605 he is nowhere to be found. Dering’s biography is a mystery until 1610, when the young composer supplicated for the Oxford degree of B.Mus. Dering earns his place on this disc because, like Peter Philips, he was a Roman Catholic who left Britain behind. First he went to Rome; then he became organist to a community of English Benedictine nuns in Brussels. In 1617 and 1618, Dering published two volumes of ‘sacred songs’ suitable for use in the chamber or in church, the texts of which draw freely from the Catholic liturgy. Ardens est cor meum comes from the six-voice volume of 1618. Strictly speaking it is a Holy Week piece; its text paraphrases Mary Magdalen’s words at the sepulchre; but the imagery of its opening sentiment (‘My heart is burning’) nicely resonates with the various themes of this recital. These, then, are the five English composers who lived through the events of 1605, and whose works have been chosen to reflect the political and religious turmoil of their age. William Byrd’s viewpoint is further fleshed out below, in Deborah Mackay’s imaginary monologue. Following it is a note by Francis Pott introducing his own richly allusive piece, Master Tresham: His Ducke, commissioned by The King’s Singers for the quatercentenary commemoration of the Gunpowder Plot. John Milsom
The Gunpowder Plot Cellar, 1799. Engraving by G Dale after
1605:
Treason and Dischord The Powder Treason – a script in the persona of William Byrd by Deborah JG Mackay [1] John Dowland (1563-1626) George Whitehead’s Almand Well enough, well enough - now sit quiet a while and catch your breath. We shall have more tunes from you anon - only this I desire, that you will be as careful to express them as I was in the composing of them. Now, here’s a merry catch for us to sing. Like enough you have sung it yourselves, around the bonfire … Remember, remember the fifth of November Holler boys, holler boys. A rousing chorus, is it not, and a good chanting rhythm? What, shall we sing it all together? I see no reason why gunpowder treason - By God, I cannot forget it, by God I can not! Have ye forgot those days - how we went in fear of our lives? How king and country were so nigh rent asunder? How the blood swilled over the pavements before Saint Paul’s and the Old Palace Yard in Westminster? If you have forgot the Powder Treason, it is time you were reminded. The matter is simply set forth. If it be abominable to murder the least; if to touch God’s anointed be to oppose oneself against God: then how much more than monstrous was the horror of the Powder Treason? For the Plotters did intend to blow up and tear to pieces our Lord the King, his wife and son, and the noble Lords of Parliament, and without respect of majesty, dignity, sex, age or place, most barbarously, traitorously and suddenly to destroy and swallow them up. O! – it could hardly be believed that such monsters in nature could carry the shapes of men … And yet I know not. I knew the Plotters, most of them - they were men and not monsters, men like you and me - they would speak fair, keep a promise, and say their prayers... How could these fellows have grown so desperate they would conceive such a terrible act? Was their wickedness truly devilish, or was it born of such thoughts as you or I might find in our own hearts? I will confess to you all I know, and then you must judge for yourselves. I hear some of you murmuring, what doth William Byrd know about the Powder Treason? He is only a musician! … But I am a traitor too, you know. And you may as well learn from me as any man, since I knew the actors in that play, and most of them have died of it, God forgive them ... Lord have mercy upon us, and Christ have mercy on the follies of youth whose zeal for their cause consumed them, and came near to destroy us all... [2] William Byrd (1543-1623) Kyrie from Mass for 4 voices You were asking how I know about the Powder Treason? I will explain. I am a man of parts, or, as it were, like Janus, with two faces, with knowledge of things plain and things hidden. Here I present Mr William Byrd, Gentleman of the Chapel Royal! For thirty years and more, as Queen Bess was England’s heart, I was its voice. I do not boast. My work is known throughout the land, and the Queen, God rest her, threw her protection about me - or I would not have lived so long. But Janus’s other face looks upon secrets. I am a Catholic, and it is perilous to be a Catholic in these times ... It is nigh twenty years now since the Catholic King of Spain sent his ships to cast down our Queen from her throne. The Spanish Armada was shattered, thanks be to God, Francis Drake and a foul wind. But after the Armada, your plain Englishman thought all the Papists were traitors, minded of nothing but to kill the Queen and betray Britain to the Pope and his puppets. As for me, the Queen knew I was a Catholic, but she always said she would condemn no man for the thoughts of his own heart. I was what they call a Church-Papist. I went to her church and sang her praise; but I kept the faith of my fathers, and kept my conscience to myself. I repaid her protection with loyal anthems. Give her a long life, even for ever and ever... The government wanted to snuff out the Catholic faith. They made a law that everyone must attend the new English church. Those who would not go were fined twenty crowns a month. Of such as had not money, the constables took the goods from their houses: their porridge pots, or the clothes off their beds, or their backs; and those they got nothing off, they sent to prison. But this was as nothing, compared with the treason of being, or harbouring, a priest… Have you been to Tyburn to see a hanging? It is truly edifying: the dismembering of a man to discover the anatomy of his sin. The dead man is to be dragged from the gaol to the gallows on a hurdle, as one no longer fit to tread the earth of which he was made. After he hath said his last words, he is hanged up by the neck between heaven and earth, a man unworthy to dwell in either. Then he is cut down alive and taken to the quartering-block, and his privy parts cut off and burned before his face, as one unworthily begotten. His bowels and inlayed parts are scooped out and burnt, who harboured treason in his heart. Then his head is cut off, which imagined the mischief; and at last his limbs divided and displayed in some high and eminent place, for the detestation of men … You know, Father Garnet, the Chief of the Jesuits in England, though he was a squeamish man, and his peril extreme, would go to hangings to administer the last rites to the martyrs. He knew that such a fate would be his, were he apprehended ... In the year of Grace sixteen hundred and three, the Queen died (God rest her), and James came to the throne. We Catholics hoped we might be honest folks and good friends to him, for his mother - Mary Queen of Scots - was a Catholic, and yet he behoved to say she was an honest woman. Yea, his own wife was a Catholic! And he said of the Catholics, “I would be sorry to punish their bodies for the opinions of their minds”. We believed then that our persecutions were over; by God, we thought we should be free ... [3] William Byrd A Fancie [4] William Byrd Gloria from Mass for 4 voices When King James summoned Parliament, we Catholics believed that he was preparing to remit the harsh laws that punished us. But the King, it turned out, was a great equivocator. From his infancy he had been King James the Sixth of Scotland, a king without mother or father, a king without state, honour or order. His Presbyterian tutors told him clear enough, that ‘in the kingdom of Christ Jesus, James the Saxt was nocht a king nor a laird, bot a member’. When, therefore, he became King of England, he was mightily determined to uphold the glories of the English Church, and in particular his own place as its Supreme Governor, its fidei defensor. He would not tolerate any church which obeyed its God before its King … So King James told Parliament that he entertained not the slightest intention of tolerating our religion, nor of abating one scruple of the strictures upon his Catholic subjects. He gave his bishops, and his beagle, Mr Secretary Cecil, licence and liberty to torment us. From that time, we were persecuted night and day. I recall a raid, at the manor house of Baddesley Clinton, where the Jesuits were wont to gather. The pursuivants came riding out at midnight, meaning to surprise the priests in their beds. When at the first knock the door was not opened, they broke it down, and ran through the house with naked sword, like men possessed. They smashed the locks and burst open doors; they measured the walls and fireplaces, to see how they met, whether chambers were hidden therein; they ripped out the panelling, or ran it through with the sword to kill any who might be hiding within. They stripped the beds and rummaged the covers to see if they were warm - one lady had her shift torn off her body as they snatched the cross from her neck. When after all this they found no priest, they besieged the house for days until any soul hidden within must surely die of hunger, and then they left with hatred and disdain, taking the master of the house with them as a hostage. There were a few Catholic lords of such wealth and substance that the King molested them not; he prized their loyalty more than he feared their faith. My patron was one such - Lord Petre, of Ingatestone Hall in Essex. In his house was a fine high chapel, with an organ, and he himself was a musician, and owned many instruments, and had choristers - both male and female - who were members of his household. Sometimes other lords came to visit, and many priests, even Father Garnet, the Superior of the Jesuits, as I told you before ... he had a fine high tenor voice ... When we were gathered we would make holy-day as if heaven were truly come to earth ... We needed a new music, of course. The old tunes by such as my dear master, Thomas Tallis, had been written for great choirs, to resound through the lofty spaces of cathedrals and abbeys, amid the wafting incense. But our new hidden church needed little liturgies for five, or four, or three voices; whoever might come safely and sing softly - but in the Latin tongue, as is fit for the praise of God ... And who was to write these tunes? So many Catholic musicians had fled - the dear friend of my youth, Ferrabosco, the lion, hounded out as a spy in ‘seventy-two; young Dering - God knows where he is, but not I; my pupil Philips, fled to Antwerp - he’s making his way, though I have seen some of his recent work, the Italians have been at him, I fear, his motets are - outlandish … So I set to writing masses and motets for the English Catholics. I had no teacher, nothing to guide me but fifty-year-old works by Tallis and Shepherd. And yet I believe that God taught me to frame tunes fit for the task … You see, nothing but heavenly harmony will do for the sacred words which sound the praises of God. And there is such profound and hidden power in the very ideas expressed by these words, that to one reflecting attentively on divine things, the right notes somehow occur spontaneously .... I need hardly mention that Lord Petre owns an extensive collection of my works... [5] Richard Dering (c.1580-1630) Ardens est cor meum [6] William Byrd Civitas sancti tui [7] Peter Philips (1560/1-1628) Ave Maria gratia plena We Catholics were now at the nadir of our miseries. It pleased God to chasten us, we who had hoped so much of King James, and been so disappointed. We older folk had lived much of our lives under persecution, and accepted it as a trial from God. But among us were some young, ardent gentlemen, and they found it intolerable to stand by and see their families crushed. Do you not see how the canker of persecution perverted these noble spirits to wickedness? They believed that there would be no help for them unless they chose to help themselves. So we come to Robert Catesby of Ashby St Ledgers - Mr Robin - aged four and thirty years, from an old Northamptonshire Catholic family. He bethought him of a way at one instant to deliver the Catholics from all their bonds; in a word withal to blow up King and Parliament with Gunpowder. For, since in that place had they done all their mischief, perchance God had designed that place for their punishment. Mr Robin sent for his dearest friend, Thomas Wintour, and broke the scheme to him. When at first Mr Tom protested at the plan, Mr Robin answered that the nature of the disease required so sharp a remedy ... Then the two went about to seek a lieutenant who knew aught about gunpowder. By and by they found one, a notable soldier and yet a sober, conscientious fellow, diligent in his faith; tall - thus - with stooping shoulders and a great broad beard grizzled with white … you recall his name, I daresay? - Guido, or Guy, Fawkes. More joined them anon, dazzled by Mr Robin’s charm and the horrid sense of his scheme. Mr Percy, the Wright boys, Mr Rookwood, Mr Bates, even Sir Everard Digby, the darling of the Court. The last of them was Mr Francis Tresham, a rich lord, of whom even his friends said that he cared more for his own welfare than the good of the Catholics. You shall hear more of him presently. These men swore their compact in the affair, to carry it through to the uttermost and reveal to none what they intended. Afterward, they went in to Mass together, as meek as lambs, firm in their belief that they were doing what God himself had ordained for them ... [8] William Byrd Credo from Mass for 4 voices The gentlemen went anon to London, and shortly came upon a We met that summer of 1605, in Huddington Court. It was the last time I saw Father Garnet before he was martyred - the last time I saw Robin Catesby and his friends, too. We kept the feast of Corpus Christi with great solemnity and music, and on the day of the octave we made a solemn procession round a great garden, the house being watched, which we knew not till the next day when we departed... One of Father Garnet’s priests came to him there in some agitation. This Father had received Mr Robin’s confession, and thus had learned the whole business, which he made known now to Father Garnet. Father Garnet was in dismay. He might disclose the Plot to no man, it being confided to him under the seal of confession. When he privily questioned the gentlemen themselves, they denied all. He exhorted them not to act rashly, but to trust in God and bide quiet. But they believed that they were doing a work ordained of God, in comparison of which nothing signified, not their own lives, nor anyone else’s. They heeded not Father Garnet. Autumn approached. Parliament was summoned for the fifth of November, and
in due time the Lords began to arrive in town. “My Lord, out of the love I bear you, I have a care for your preservation. Therefore, I would advise you as you tender your life to devise some excuse to shift off your attendance at this Parliament, and retire yourself into your county to await the event in safety. For God and man have concurred to punish the wickedness of this time ... I say they shall receive a terrible blow this Parliament, and yet they shall not see who hurts them ...” Monteagle delivered this letter to Mr Secretary Cecil, and he in due course delivered it to His Majesty ... Now, there are few secrets at Court. Word of the letter came back to Mr Robin and his friends where they waited in London. They suspected that it was Mr Tresham that betrayed them, of purpose to bring himself into favour with the King. Tresham denied it with such vehement oaths that they believed him … Yet the damage was done. Was the Plot now discovered? Mr Guy was sent to search the cellar, to see whether anything had been tampered with - but was told nothing about the letter, so that he be not frightened. He reported that all was well ... But all was not well. Mr Secretary Cecil must have gone about in those few days to discover a great deal of the Plot - whether from Francis Tresham or from another, we shall not know - else he would never have permitted the preparations to continue for the coming Parliament. He wanted the Plot to ripen, that the fruit, when he plucked it, might be all the sweeter … The Privy Council met, and ordered the Lord Chamberlain to
make an inspection of the Parliament buildings. This the Lord Chamberlain
duly did, on Monday after lunch - the fourth of November. Going through
the ground floor rooms and into the This night, past midnight, Sir Thomas Knyvett, a gentleman of the King’s household, goes forth with soldiers to search the rooms below the Parliament chamber. But at the entrance he meets a man fully dressed, a tall, desperate-looking fellow, booted and spurred! Knyvett arrests the man and binds him fast, takes his keys, and unlocks the cellar. The soldiers begin to move aside the bundles of wood, and the first thing they find is gunpowder: thirty-six great barrels full of it. Nearby stands a dark-lantern with a candle lit inside. Then Knyvett has the prisoner searched, and finds on him a match and three fuses. The man - it is Guy Fawkes - showeth not the least dismay. He remarks that they are lucky to have come upon him now, while he is just finishing his preparations, or they would none of them be talking about it, for they would all have been blown sky-high... [9] John Dowland Sir Henry Umpton’s Funeral Word spread that ten thousand pounds of gunpowder had been discovered in Westminster, and the King and Parliament saved by a hair from destruction. The gates of London were under guard, the Ports were sealed. By the end of that day - the fifth of November - London was in turmoil, with terrified crowds thronging the streets... To calm the uproar, Government allowed that the citizens might celebrate the King’s deliverance - though without violence or disorder - by lighting bonfires throughout the city. This indeed proved a popular measure ... I know not why the common folk so love burning faggots in the fields on freezing winter nights: I trust they’ll soon grow out of it … Meanwhile, Guido Fawkes was conducted to the Tower and examined, first by the gentler tortures, and then proceeding by degrees until all was discovered ... it is said he was racked for two days and nights before he broke down. Warrants were posted through all England for the arrest of the plotters. Mr Robin and the others rode north from London a hundred miles to Mr Tom Wintour’s family in Huddington. They still believed, even then, that the Catholics would rise to their cause. But they found their own homes barred to them, their families full of horror at the evil they had planned, and of terror for their own fate. When the news came to Coughton Court, there was a large party there, including Father Garnet, and Lady Mary Digby, Sir Everard’s wife. She burst out weeping for her little sons, who were now a traitor’s children, and she would not be comforted. Father Garnet cried, ‘We are all utterly undone’. His loyal friends hurried him to Hindlip House, where the priest-holes were better hidden, praying thereby to save his life. The plotters meanwhile galloped on; they passed through Warwick, looting arms and horses as they went, and came late on the seventh of November to Holbeach House in Staffordshire. Here they determined to fight, or die. The following morning they were beset by soldiers, and in the battle that ensued, some of them were shot and killed, among them Mr Robin Catesby. The eight survivors were brought back to London and the Tower, where they were questioned until every detail of the Plot had been confessed. In January they were brought to Westminster, that selfsame place they had sought to destroy, and there in Westminster Hall they were convicted of high treason. When he was sentenced, Sir Everard Digby asked only for mercy for his wife and little children. The Prosecutor answered him mockingly with a Psalm: let his wife be a widow, and his children vagabonds, let his posterity be destroyed, and his name quite put out. Sir Everard then said, ‘If I may but hear any of your Lordships say, you forgive me, I shall go more cheerfully to the gallows’. The Lords answered: ‘God forgive you, and we do’. Two days later, at eight o’ clock in the morning, Digby was taken from the Tower to St Paul’s, where he was hanged, drawn and quartered, and three others with him. The rest were executed the following day in Old Palace Yard, outside Parliament. The last to die was Guido Fawkes. His body being weak with the torture and sickness he was scarce able to go up the ladder, yet with much ado, by the help of the hangman, went high enough, poor devil, to break his neck by the fall. Father Henry Garnet, who had known of the Plot and yet, under the seal of confession, revealed it not, was taken at Hindlip House by the pursuivants, being starved out of his hiding-place after a ten day search. He was given a travesty of a trial in London, and sentenced to die. Father Garnet, who had ever quailed at the horror of the gallows, shrank not from his own death. So holy were his final words that the crowd, that had come to bay at him, was moved in spirit, and when they saw him swing, many of them rushed forward and seized his feet and pulled upon them, to hasten his death, so that he suffer no further. Thus was he martyred… The whole of England - nay, the whole world - reeled at the horror of the Powder Treason. The fifth of November was to be consecrated to perpetual memory, remembering throughout all generations the grace of the Lord in the deliverance of King and country. For years afterwards, the bishops would be reminding us in their sermons of the disaster so narrowly averted: ‘so much blood, as would have made it rain blood; so many baskets of heads, so many pieces of rent bodies cast up and down, and scattered all over the face of the earth’ … Meanwhile, such Catholic lords as were brave enough rushed to kiss James’s feet and protest they were his loyalest subjects. In London, Mr Shakespeare penned a Scottish play; the crowds shivered in glee to see Macbeth bind himself to Hell’s ministers and kill the King, overturning the order of nature and nation, before he met his own destruction. At court the composers too jostled to present their anthems of devotion. I wrote one, too - at least I set some craven words to an old tune. It was no time to hold your tongue, if you wanted to keep your head ... [10] Thomas Weelkes (c.1576-1623) O Lord how joyful is the King Since that time, it has pleased God to continue us in our persecutions, so that we must learn every day to trust more perfectly in him alone. I heard of a fellow in London who was clapped into Newgate for having about him a pernicious book of Popish songs by one William Byrd ... actually, Newgate is so stuffed with Catholics it’s the safest place in London to hear the Mass. I have some trouble afoot, too ... here is a summons from the Lately, I heard, Sir Everard Digby’s widow hath found a good priest to tutor her little boys. Young Catholic men still flock abroad to study with the Jesuits, and their sisters will be nuns in Louvain and pray for us. It is strange - or perhaps not so strange - but our very persecutions make us hold the more firm to our faith. I have decided that I will leave the Chapel Royal, and sing no more for King James. This - here - is the latest volume of my Gradualia. Here you will find the Offices for the whole year which are fit to the feasts of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the Saints, together with some few songs for five, four or three voices, with their words drawn from the fount of sacred writings. Moreover, so that they may be correctly placed in the liturgy, I have added an index at the end of the book in which all the songs for the same feasts will be found listed together. A modern and convenient collection for the better praising of the holy name of God. [12] John Dowland M. Bucton’s Galliard [13] William Byrd Sanctus & Benedictus from Mass for 4 voices Now, gentles, I have played my part, and it is your turn. Consider the actors in this play: King James, Robin Catesby, Guido Fawkes, Francis Tresham, Father Henry Garnet. Which of these, think you, was a martyr, and which a devil? Which of them was a hero, and which a traitor to his people? Who among them stands in need of God’s mercy? You must decide. I will condemn none of you for the thoughts of your own hearts. But you, friends; I pray that you will remember, remember the fifth of November, and be wise, lest it come round again and not be catched with a dark lantern and a lighted match. Remember how good Englishmen feared one another, only because they used different ways to praise the same Lord. Remember how the terror of those days oppressed and diminished us all alike, both Protestant and Catholic. Remember that tyranny breeds treachery, and treason begets tyranny. And of your charity, remember me. I will pray in turn for you: Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, dona nobis pacem. Now I must away and leave you, for I have work to do. If you have need of me hereafter, you will find me in Church. [14] Francis Pott (born 1957) Master Tresham: His Ducke [15] William Byrd Agnus Dei from Mass for 4 voices Master Tresham: His Ducke
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Francis Pott The Gunpowder Plotters, terrorists of their day, now enjoy a particular grim resonance in our own. This encouraged reflection on the terrorist of the ‘9/11’ era and the western plutocrats - murky as their precious oil - who might be said to have created him. Meanwhile, the toppling of a tyrant in Iraq shows how terror may reciprocally fashion the tyrant, whether it be the dictator sealing the lid on the pressure cooker or the western political opportunist, Messianic in self-belief but holding highly suspect cards. An odd fascination attends Guy Fawkes’s initial anonymity under interrogation. ‘I can yet … meet with no man that knows him; the Letter found upon him gives him another name’, runs a tetchy phrase in the King’s Articles. Of another, earlier mysterious visitant, Thomas Traherne was to ask ‘Who art Thou, who bleeding here causest the ground to tremble and the rocks to rend?’. The ultimate self-belief of martyrdom (following betrayal, moreover) carries a dramatic echo of events upon which Christian faith - of whatever hue –is founded. Thus, certain prophetic phrases from the psalms began to ‘insist upon their own direction’ as I assembled my texts. Then I lighted upon Alciato’s Book of Emblems. Published as a Latin text in Augsburg in 1531 and widely translated, this was a runaway best seller of its epoch. Emblem books express the period’s predilection for riddling and symbolism. Textual and visual motifs, mythological references and multilingual puns interact to assemble puzzles, often of a moralising nature. Alciato provides 212 emblem poems, each uniting a quasi-proverbial ‘motto’ with a woodcut and epigram. Though often aimed explicitly at identifiable individuals, the Emblems are sufficiently cryptic for application elsewhere. Reference to a man ‘farting’ forth a serpent and serpent ‘belching’ out a man seems scatological, but is openly addressed to Massimilliano, Duke of Milan, in direct reference to his heraldic arms. Transplanted, this provided my reference to the deadly symbiosis of regimes and terrorists. A passage on Janus is appropriate since the conspirators stood trial during January 1606, but also because the betrayer is two-faced - while he who wishes to stay alive has eyes everywhere. Alciato’s fable of the duck discloses no specific target, but is apt as a
finger of accusation levelled at the Judas amongst the Francis Tresham is somewhat loftily dismissed in posterity as a man of limited intelligence (one might think him sharper than those he betrayed - if indeed he did). His recusant father, Sir Thomas (1545-1605), who had spent fifteen years in prison, was one of England’s most singular architects. In 2004 I visited Rushton Triangular Hall in Northamptonshire, a small but striking oddity erected by him between 1594 and 1596. Without practical function and never inhabited, it is less a folly than a symbolic statement. Thus it felicitously mirrors the encryptions of Alciato (moreover, Tresham kept at least seven emblem books in his library). As a device, the building makes play with the Trinity, both by possessing only three sides and by punning on Tresham / ‘Tres am’. Covered by arcane geometric symbols and numbers which elude definitive interpretation to this day, the pinnacled edifice preserves an air of quasi-Masonic strangeness and secrecy. Among its several inscriptions appears the phrase from Ecclesiasticus, ‘respicite non mihi soli laboravi’ (‘Behold, I have not laboured for myself alone’). The prophetic irony of this, when applied to Tresham fils, is inescapable. Accordingly the phrase is appropriated. ‘Non mihi’ occupies a gable of its own, and seems to acquire an additional resonance if set against one who betrays to secure his own absolution. No less apt might have been the Latin from Habbakkuk on another façade: ‘I have considered thy works, Lord, and been afraid’. I have aimed, then, to respond to the politico-religious espionage and lurking menace of the period around 1605. I am indebted to Hugh Hetherington of Salisbury Cathedral Choir for his aperçu that Sir Francis Walsingham’s monogram, a long-handled lorgnette (denoting his function as ‘the eyes and ears’ of Elizabeth I), bears closer iconic resemblance to Ian Fleming’s device ‘007’ than can be attributed to mere coincidence -though one might add that 007 is also the telephone area code for Moscow. In the world of the spy, it seems, little changes. Either way, I wished Byrd to articulate the pervasive dread and starting-at-shadows which seem plausibly to characterise the recusant experience. Accordingly, I have set Alciato in his original Latin (with the Tresham père contribution conspiratorially added). The language proclaims Byrd’s own clandestine defiance. Moreover, though only a token nod is made at placing its true nature beyond reach, by being set in a quasi-devotional idiom the text symbolises things which are not as they seem. Byrd’s implied presence co-exists with a note of jarring discrepancy between manner and meaning. Additional texts provide glimpses into the aftermath for Guy Fawkes of betrayal and capture. Pointedly opposing underlying Latin with the Protestant mother tongue, spoken phrases from his interrogation eventually loom from the shadows. First come English snatches from the Psalms, selected for their macabre consonance with the plight of Fawkes and supposed perfidy of Tresham. In deploying these I tried to compound the listener’s intermittent uncertainty whether the voice heard is the Crown’s or that of its prisoner, the denounced foe a King or his would-be assassin: we return to man and serpent, locked eternally in their gruesome embrace. Where, asks Alciato, does one end and the other begin?.. A phrase came to mind from the great contemporary poet Geoffrey Hill. Writing of his sequence Funeral Music (on the Wars of the Roses), Hill described his attempt at an ‘ornate and heartless music punctuated by mutterings, blasphemies and cries for help’. By now, bogus polyphony has yielded to sounds which really are by Byrd.
These are from Civitas sancti tui, chosen partly because it is so
arrestingly bleak, but primarily because it offers an icon of the entire
matter at issue: subsequently Byrd sanctioned an English version which,
with judicious amendments to repetition, fits the same music. ‘Sion
deserta est’ from the Latin is heard here, but, one by one and almost
imperceptibly, the voices defect into English, symbolising final
capitulation to the inimical will of an estranged monarch. A poem by
Sidney Keyes, killed in the Second War aged twenty, borrows the lips of an
ageing Byrd as I have, and might have featured here. ‘My spirit sings in
silence’, laments his resigned composer. Accordingly, in Tresham Byrd’s
mother tongue finally gags him. As with Schumann ending his song cycle
Frauenliebe und Leben, wordless instrumental cadences have the last say, here evoking ‘desolate and void’
Jerusalem - until Another two centuries would pass before a fellow visionary of Byrd’s took up ‘arrows of desire’ of another sort for the building of a new Jerusalem in England’s green and pleasant land. Francis Pott, 2005.
William Byrd 4-part Mass [2] - Kyrie
Kyrie eleison.
Lord have mercy upon us. [4] - Gloria Gloria in excelsis Deo. Et in terra pax hominibus bone voluntatis. Laudamus te. Benedicimus te. Adoramus te. Glorificamus te. Gratias agimus tibi propter magnam gloriam tuam. Domine Deus, Rex celestis, Deus Pater omnipotens. Domine Fili unigenite, Jesu Christe, Domine Deus, Agnus Dei, Filius Patris, Qui tollis peccata mundi miserere nobis. Qui tollis peccata mundi, suscipe deprecationem nostram. Qui sedes ad dexteram Patris, miserere nobis. Quoniam tu solus sanctus, tu solus Dominus, tu solus altissimus, Jesu Christe, cum Sancto Spiritu, in gloria Dei Patris. Amen. Glory be to God on high, and in earth peace, towards men of goodwill. We praise thee, we bless thee, we worship thee, we glorify thee, we give thanks to thee for Thy great glory, O Lord God, heavenly King, God the Father Almighty. O Lord, the only-begotten Son Jesu Christ; O Lord God, Lamb of God, Son of the Father, that takest away the sins of the world, have mercy upon us. Thou that takest away the sins of the world, receive our prayer. Thou that sittest at the right hand of God the Father, have mercy upon us. For thou only art holy; thou only art the Lord; thou only, O Christ, with the Holy Ghost, art most high in the glory of God the Father. Amen. [5] Ardens est cor meum – Richard Dering Ardens est cor meum, desidero videre Dominum meum; quaero et non invenio, ubi posuerunt eum. Si tu sustulisti eum, dicite mihi, et ego eum tollam. My heart is burning; I desire to see my Lord. I search for him and know not where they have laid him. If thou have borne him hence, tell me where thou hast laid him and I will take him away. (John 20:15) [6] Civitas sancti tui – William Byrd Civitas sancti tui facta est deserta. Sion deserta facta est. Ierusalem desolata est. Thy holy city is made desolate. Sion is wasted and brought low, Jerusalem desolate and void. [7] Ave Maria gratia plena – Peter Philips ed. Lionel Pike Ave Maria gratiae plena Dominus tecum, Benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructus ventris tui, Jesus. Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc et in hora mortis nostrae. Amen. Hail Mary full of grace the Lord is with thee, Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and in the hour of our death. Amen. [8] - Credo Credo in unum Deum, Patrem omnipotentem, factorem celi et terre, visibilium omnium et invisibilium. Et in unum Dominum Jesum Christum Filium Dei unigenitum. Et ex Patre natum ante omnia secula. Deum de Deo, lumen de lumine, Deum verum de Deo vero. Genitum, non factum, consubstantialem Patri: per quem omnia facta sunt. Qui propter nos homines, et propter nostram salutem descendit de celis. Et incarnatus est de Spiritu Sancto ex Maria Virgine: et homo factus est. Crucifixus etiam pro nobis: sub Pontio Pilato passus, et sepultus est. Et resurrexit tertia die, secundum Scripturas. Et ascendit in celum: sedet ad dexteram Patris. Et iterum venturus est cum gloria, judicare vivos et mortuos: cujus regni non erit finis. Et exspecto resurrectionem mortuorum. Et vitam venturi seculi. Amen. I believe in one God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, And of all things visible and invisible And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, Begotten of his Father before all worlds. God of God, Light of Light, Very God of very God; Begotten not made; Being of one substance with the Father; By Whom all things were made: Who for us men, and for our salvation came down from heaven, And was incarnate by the Holy Ghost of the Virgin Mary, And was made man. And was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate. He suffered and was buried, And the third day He rose again according to the scriptures, And ascended into heaven, And sitteth on the right hand of the Father. And He shall come again with glory to judge both the quick and the dead: Whose kingdom shall have no end. And I look for the Resurrection of the dead, And the life of the world to come. Amen. [10] O Lord how joyful is the King – Thomas Weelkes
O Lord how joyful is the King in Thy strength and power: how [11] From Virgin’s womb/Rejoice, rejoice – William Byrd
O sing unto this glittering glorious King;
[13] - Sanctus and Benedictus Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus Dominus Deus Sabaoth. Pleni sunt caeli et terra gloria tua. Hosanna in excelsis. Benedictus qui venit in nomine Domini. Hosanna in excelsis. Holy, Holy, Holy Lord God of hosts. Heaven and earth are full of Thy glory. Hosanna in the highest. Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest.
Ciuitatis Westmonasteriensis pars [Westminster 1647]
[14]
Master Tresham: His Ducke 43: Innumeris agitur Respublica nostra procellis. 43: Our state is shaken by innumerable storms. 8: Omnes in trivio sumus, atque hoc tramite vitae Fallimur, ostendat ni Deus ipse viam. 8: We are all at the crossroads, and we mistake our course in life, if God himself does not show the way. 61: Fusca viro facies, et stridens vocula… 61: The face of the man was dark, his voice shrill. ‘Respicite non mihi soli laboravi’ [Ecclesiasticus 33: V: xviii] ‘Behold, I have not laboured for myself alone.’
18: Iane bifrons, qui iam transacta futuraque calles,
18: Two-faced Janus, you who know the things that have
50: Altilis allectator anas…
50: A duck fattened as a lure used to come and go to her masters. 1: Exiliens infans sinuosi e faucibus anguis… 1: An infant springing from the jaws of a curling snake…
5: Quonam hoc compellem nomine monstrum
5: How should I address by name this biform monster, which is
not man, and not a snake? The man farts out a snake; the From Byrd’s Civitas sancti tui : Sion deserta facta est. Ierusalem desolata est.
Ps. 127 v. 2:
Ps. 33 v. 15:
Ps. 35 v. 8:
Ps. 109, vv. 7, 12:
Ps. 55 vv. 3, 12:
Ps. 35 v. 8:
Ps. 35 v. 23:
Ps. 31 vv. 15, 13: Sion is wasted and brought low, Jerusalem desolate and void.
Ps.7 v. 16:
Ps. 31 v. 10:
Ps. 50 v. 21:
Ps. 37 v. 9:
Ps. 69 v. 29:
Ps. 31 v. 6:
Ps. 41 v. 8:
Spoken lines from the interrogation of ‘John Johnson’, alias Guy/Guido
Fawkes:
Where was he born?
Being demanded where he lay on Thursday at night.
What letters have been delivered to you of late from beyond the seas? He confesseth he hath been a Recusant about this twenty years. From later collects of thanksgiving for the King’s deliverance:
“We confess, it was thy mercy alone that we were not then consumed. Let
the consideration of this work in us true repentance and fruitful love in
all holy obedience, and that for thy dear son’s sake, Jesus Christ, our
only Mediator and Advocate. Amen.” Adapted from the Advent Prose; ‘Rorate, Caeli’ [15] - Agnus Dei
Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi: miserere nobis.
Lamb of God, that takest away the sins of the world: have mercy on us. |
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