Tom & Will

Program: #23-13   Air Date: Mar 27, 2023

NOTE: All of the music on this program features the King’s Singers. They is available on the Signum label and is CD SIGCD731.

400 years ago, in 1623, England lost two of it's greatest composers: William Byrd and Thomas Weelkes. In a program marking this double anniversary, The King's Singers and Fretwork turn their focus to the bold personalities of these two men, Will and Tom. Featuring well-known gems by the two composers, alongside works which had never been recorded before and which are rarely heard live, Tom and Will unlocks some of the humanity behind these two giants of Elizabethan music. Presented in The King's Singers' unique style, this program is filled with beauty, drama and storytelling. As part of this project, The King's Singers and Fretwork have commissioned two new works for their joint forces, by two of Britain's great living composers: Sir James MacMillan and Roderick Williams. These works only feature in the version performed by The King's Singers and Fretwork, but represent a commitment to keeping the spirit of Byrd and Weelkes alive in today's musical landscape.

Patrick Dunachie (countertenor), Edward Button (countertenor), Julian Gregory (tenor), Christopher Bruerton (baritone), Nick Ashby (baritone), Jonathan Howard (bass) Musicians: Fretwork Viol Consort

William Byrd and Thomas Weelkes died in 1623, Byrd in his ninth decade, Weelkes barely half that. Eighteen works, mainly secular in nature and several relatively unknown today, are presented here, along with two inspired new compositions from Roderick Williams and James MacMillan following in the tradition of the musical elegy. The beguiling intertwining of voices and viols throughout the programme remains as potent today as it must have been four centuries ago.

From BBC Classics: The title Tom and Will refers to two of our greatest Renaissance composers, Thomas Weelkes and William Byrd. Fortuitously they both managed to die in 1623 thus facilitating this fascinating comparison of their styles in this anniversary year, especially as performed here by the extremely accomplished musicians of The King’s Singers and Fretwork.

From Weelkes we have the immensely subtle Hark all ye lovely saints, set to springy, vertiginous changes of metre beautifully negotiated by the singers, and his In nomine a 4, performed in a delightfully skittish manner by Fretwork. The same alluring intricacy is served up in Byrd’s If women could be fair, but some of these pieces defy any obvious ‘expressive’ approach. After all, who knows what Thule, the period of cosmography is really about, and what is to be done with Byrd’s lament on the death of Tallis (Ye sacred muses) set mostly in the major key – except sing it nicely? This last is a companion to Weelkes’s touching lament on the death of Thomas Morley (Death hath deprived me) and both are paralleled by two impressive elegies by James MacMillan and Roderick Williams. The kaleidoscopic textures of MacMillan’s piece are beautifully haunting and unsettling. Both are premiere recordings, and – according to the booklet – so too is Weelkes’s Say dear, though in fact this was recorded some years ago by the Deller Consort (on Harmonia Mundi France) and The Purcell Consort of Voices (Turnabout). That said, this new release is one of the finest recordings of this repertoire and can be warmly recommended.

Anthony Pryer

Composer Info

Thomas Weelkes, William Byrd, Roderick Williams , James MacMillan

CD Info

Signum label CD SIGCD731