William Byrd

When Kerry McCarthy gave a lecture recently to guests at Sidney Sussex College in Cambridge she said that William Byrd (c1540 – 1623) set none of his music to the text of the King James Version of the Bible. The lecture was given in celebration of the 400th anniversary of the Bible’s publication.

Kerry McCarthy is an influential authority on Stondon Massey’s great composer, an Associate Professor of Duke University in the United States, and prime mover and shaker of the Byrd Festival in Portland, Oregon.

Thinking somewhat laterally, it seems to almost state the obvious that William Byrd would disregard the ‘new’ Anglican Bible of 1611. Byrd was an ardent recusant Catholic living in semi-retirement at Stondon Place in the quiet village of Stondon Massey in Essex. Four hundred years ago he had just published an entire edition of two cycles of Gradualia: illegal settings of Masses for the complete liturgical year to be sung in secret by ‘papist sympathisers’ at such places as Ingatestone Hall, the home of the Petre family, Byrd’s patrons. The year 1611 also marked the final publication of the composer’s work. Here was a man of at least three score and ten years who probably could not be bothered with the new-fangled version of the Bible.

The origin of the King James Version of the Bible is admirably covered in Derek Wilson’s new book, ‘The People’s Bible’ (2010). He tells the story of how churchman of various persuasions, mainstream Anglicans and Puritans, in 1604 flattered King James I into the creation of a unifying work bearing his name. Over six years six teams of scholars in Westminster, Cambridge and Oxford toiled over existing English language translations to create, as a Committee, a definitive work for its time.

Derek Wilson devotes the first seventy pages of his two hundred page book to those Bibles which had already translated and printed in English during the sixteenth century. Among those was the illegally imported translation by Tyndale, which cost him his life in 1536. Ironically only three years later King Henry VIII decreed that another translation, the Great Bible, be made available in all churches up and down the land. The Geneva Bible was published abroad in 1560; the Bishops Bible of 1568 followed which omitted controversial margin notes of the Geneva Bible; and the Rheims Bible published in the Low Countries in 1582. The Douai-Rheims Bible was the fruit of an English College, founded by William Allen, an exiled Jesuit biblical scholar, completed by Gregory Martin.

Byrd’s religious sympathies must have been towards the Rheims Bible, a ‘Catholic translation’ probably used covertly during the services at Ingatestone Hall. We need only think too of Byrd’s reaction to the martyrdom of Edmund Campion in Byrd’s motet, ‘Why Do I Use My Paper Ink and Pen’, and known friendship with Father Henry Garnett who was later arrested and hung in connection with the Gunpowder Plot of 1605 because he had heard, in a confessional, the plans of the conspirators. Garnett was a marked man. Throughout his trial was referred to as “Mr Garnett” because the authorities did not recognise his Jesuit priesthood.

1605 and 1607 were the years of publication of Byrd’s two books of Gradualia. This illustrates the dangerous path Byrd trod.

Byrd’s frequent naming before the Essex Archdeaconry Court by the parson and churchwardens of Stondon Massey for non-attendance at St Peter & St Paul Church, coupled with heavy fines, is further illustration of his refusal to embrace the established church. What is interesting is his wife, who died c1606, was consistently named Ellen and not Juliana. Byrd biographer John Harley (1997) suggests this was the same person. We can deduce that whilst Byrd was not known in his immediate local community he moved nonetheless in influential circles and avoided the penalties associated with blatant Catholicism, that of imprisonment, confiscation of property and death. Nowhere could the Catholic mass be legally celebrated.

There is, perhaps, another reason why Byrd did not use the Authorised Version of the Bible. Derek Wilson points out that although the research was completed in 1610, the work itself was hurriedly proof-read; compiled for publication and printed the following year. The finished work was littered with errors and despite stringent efforts to ensure that the King James Version was the only Bible produced in England, copies of the Geneva Bible continued to be imported until the 1640s. In the early days the Authorised Version was hardly a roaring success, but its monopoly, and corrections, ensured its longevity.

The King James Bible was intended to be read out aloud during Divine Worship. Even today its seventeenth century text seems to work through being heard. The success of the King James Version was due to an accident of history. It became the vogue in seventeenth century worship for the pulpit to take more importance than the altar. Lengthy sermons were not uncommon. At Stondon Massey we find part of a triple-decker pulpit. Reverend Reeve, a former Rector, wrote:

“The pulpit in Stondon Church with the reading desk attached was erected during [Nathanial] Ward’s incumbency, and bears the date 1630. In all probability it was introduced into the Church in response to an order from Bishop Laud, but I think we may trace Ward’s handiwork also, and his personal superintendence. On the panels of the desk we find the words “Christ is All in All” the text of the famous discourse of his brother Samuel, “preacher of Ipswich”, which was published in 1627, while in the pulpit is carved “2 Tim. iv. 1-2”, the reference being to the words of St Paul, ‘Preach the word in season and out of season’, which no doubt was a favourite Apostolic injunction with the Puritan divine.”

It is to the Wards that we must look for the Stondon connection and the Authorised Version. Samuel Ward, the Ipswich preacher, became Master of Sidney Sussex College in 1610. But he was also a member of the Cambridge II team of translators responsible, with others, for the Apocrypha. His brother, Nathanial, became incumbent at Stondon Massey in 1628, and was one of the foremost Puritan preachers in Essex.

Nathaniel Ward’s nemesis was William Laud, the Bishop of London who on appointment in 1628 immediately forbade the printing of the Geneva Bible. Laud is described by Wilson as “the scourge of the Puritans” and Reeve as “determined to strengthen the traditional and Catholic position of the Church of England.”

Reeve takes up the story: “The Rector of Stondon was “presented” … “for not wearing a surplice in Church for the two last years past, and that prayers were not constantly read in Church on Wednesdaies, Fridaies and Holydaies”.

“A few years later, however, the end came. The Bishop’s books in the Registry of St Paul’s record that on 27th Sept. 1632 Nathaniel Ward was suspended; on 30th Oct. of the same year he was excommunicated for non-obedience to the Canons, and on 16th Dec. he was deprived.

“On his expulsion from his living, Ward determined to visit the New England about which he had heard so much, and in the following year (1634) he set sail.”

The book which these New England settlers took with them was the Authorised Version of the Bible. Over time wherever Britain colonised and created its Empire, wherever the atlas was coloured red, the Bible was present in the culture of each new society.

The influence of this Bible spread because of its association with the monarchy, with stability and of order in society. Melvyn Bragg, for example, lists the King James Bible in his set of essays, ’12 Books That Changed The World’ (2006). Shakespeare’s ‘The First Folio’, Darwin’s ‘Origin of Species’, Adam Smith’s ‘Wealth of Nations’ and ‘The Rule Book for Association Football’ are also listed in his hall of fame. Perhaps it is an overstatement to suggest that the AV played a part in the democratic influence of England on other nations, but it is no understatement that the book had no cultural affect worldwide. It is interesting to reflect that while Britain considers AV – alternative voting – in a referendum, elsewhere in the world there is unrest and uprising against leaders in Middle Eastern countries.

The King James Version became, certainly for over 300 years, a core work in the English language and the teaching of the English language both at home and abroad. It became part of England’s literary heritage. This was both its success and long term failure. Melvyn Bragg suggests that there are some Christians who believe that only a return to regular use of the King James Version will return the nation to “the true path”. Derek Wilson says that the study of the Christian faith adapts with each age and while the works of Shakespeare, a contemporary of the Bible, could not possibly be rewritten, likewise this was mistakenly felt with the King James Version.

Wilson also cites why the KJV’s popularity fell into decline, pointing to the First World War, the break-up of the hierarchical society and increasing secularisation of the nation. Changes in education too meant that learning text by rote is considered out dated and that widespread use of the Bible in teaching in schools is now politically incorrect.

In the Church of England this year, strenuous efforts are being made to encourage greater personal Bible reading. Clergy say that the Bible provides moral compass for peoples’ lives and the King James Version is more than a piece of towering seventeenth century literature.

Early music lovers from far and wide flocked to hear the music of William Byrd at Stondon Massey Church over two weekends in May. William Byrd lived in the village until his death in 1623.

A ‘William Byrd Festival’ was organised by the congregation of St Peter & St Paul Church in order to raise money to build a new Garden of Remembrance in the churchyard where Byrd is thought to have been buried in an unmarked grave. The Festival not only realised £2200 but also raised the profile of the man who ought to be as well-known as his contemporary, William Shakespeare. To use a pun, the Festival killed two birds with one stone.

William Byrd was a recusant Catholic, refusing to attend the Church of England at a time when staying away from Services was illegal. He, with other ‘papists’, was frequently named before the Archdeaconry Court and fined huge sums of money. Byrd wrote music for the Catholic faith, which was banned, but was spared punishment because he had friends in high places. He was a Gentleman of the Chapel Royal, the monarch’s personal choir, and his music was liked by Queen Elizabeth I and her successor King James I. The Petre family of Ingatestone Hall were his Patrons, and it was to John Petre that Byrd dedicated his second book of Latin Catholic church music in 1607. He was both loyal and yet a traitor.

Leading the cast on the first Saturday of the Festival was Richard Turbet, from the University of Aberdeen, an expert on the life and work of Byrd. He led a lecture / recital entitled “William Byrd: His Essex Years” which explored the composer’s musical output while living in Stondon Massey. He was supported by the Stondon Singers under their conductor Christopher Tinker.

The event was held twice. The present Lord Petre attended the matinee performance.

A traditional Morning Prayer service was held the following morning with music by Byrd played on the organ by John Hatt and an anthem sung by the church music group, Jubilate.

The second weekend’s events were led by a Saturday concert by the Writtle Singers, under Christine Gwynn, making their debut performance at St Peter & St Paul Church. Their programme – ‘William Byrd: Loyal Heart or Traitor?’ – explored Byrd’s life as a recusant Catholic and the protest songs he secretly composed.

The Festival concluded on the Sunday with a service of Favourite Hymns, reflecting Byrd’s wish that ‘every man should learne to sing’.

The event has put William Byrd on the map as far as the church is concerned. During the second 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. It was decided to arrange the flowers on the Memorial Tablet to the great composer inside the church. The Festival website (www.williambyrdfestival.blogspot.com), which remains open, shows that William Byrd is very popular in America with over a third of the hits coming from that country.

Members of the congregation received some lovely comments and have been encouraged to make more of William Byrd’s name in Essex. As Revd Edward Reeve, Rector of Stondon Massey wrote a century ago: “We can claim Byrd for our own”.

Two books are available at the church priced £2 each. ‘William Byrd: Some Notes’, and a biography of Reeve himself.

Introduction
The Vicar of Blackmore and Stondon Massey, Revd. Sam Brazier-Gibbs, received an unexpected call from BBC Network Radio in early May. The producer of ‘Composer of the Week’ would like to visit Stondon Massey with its presenter, Donald Macleod, and wondered whether there was any local person who they could interview about Byrd’s life in the village. I was nominated since I was researching the composer for a talk locally, and so it was that on 7 June the recording took place ‘on location’. This is the transcript of the segments of the programme in which I participated.
A Man of Many Parts
Recorded on 7 June 2023 at Stondon Massey Church. First broadcast, BBC Radio 3, Monday 3 July 2023
Donald Macleod (DM): Hello and welcome to a week celebrating the 400th anniversary of the death of the English composer William Byrd. Here on ‘Composer of the Week’ I am going to be marking the occasion by exploring his life, his character and of course lots of his music across the next few days. We will be seeing how music brought him within the orbit of royalty, politicians, and other great composers I will be talking to the Byrd expert Kerry McCarthy, and I will also be exploring some of the places Byrd knew very well.
DM: This year we are seeing William Byrd celebrated not just on Radio 3 but all over the country and I am sure around the world. It is four hundred years since his death. I have brought you to the village of Stondon Massey not far from Brentwood, and this Church of Saint Peter and Saint Paul dates from the 12th century. The Church has a pretty little tower. It begins as a square white painted square section of weatherboarding which accommodates the bells and then moves through a series of angular shifts until it becomes an octagonal spire of wooden shingles. The Church interior is very plain and simple with whitewashed walls. Well last time we were making a big Byrd anniversary back in 1923 they put up this very elegant monument on the wall under the heading of ‘Father of Musick’. The tablet reads ‘To the glory of God and memory of William Byrd lived at Stondon Place in this parish for the last 30 years of his life. He died 4th July 1623 aged 80. This tablet was erected in 1923 in celebration of the tercentenary of his death’. Well, that is why I am starting here this week in the Essex village where Byrd lived and worked for a significant part of his life. Before he came here, he dazzled congregations at Lincoln cathedral and in performances with the Royal Chapel. But we will also discover this week that Byrd was something of an outsider. It is telling that he chose this relatively isolated rural place thirty miles from the court of its concerns to spend his later decades. Let us establish right at the outset that Byrd was not a regular attender at the Church of Saint Peter and Saint Paul. His relationship with this church was never an easy one. We know that in 1612 he was asked to contribute to the upkeep of the bells. He flatly refused and will find out later that he had good reason.
DM: I am sitting here inside the Church of St Peter and St Paul in Stondon Massey in Essex a building Byrd knew well but his very literal cost did not often frequent. It is a great pleasure to meet here local historian Andrew Smith who is wearing a very smart William Byrd tie: I rather covet that I have to say. We are sharing this space with a very active insect of some kind. Andrew, 400 years ago as church attenders here we might have been met by the churchwarden of this parish a man called Denis Lolly and probably in Byrd’s case not met very cordially.
Andrew Smith (AS): No, that is true. He was a tenant of Stondon Place where William Byrd actually lived so as the churchwarden, and he would have noticed that William Byrd did not leave his home to come to the church here at Stondon Massey. At that time there was a requirement that church attendance be compulsory. It was an obligation of the clergy at the time to list and name those residents of the parish that were not attending Church. William Byrd was a recusant Catholic, someone who refused to attend the worship of the Church of England and could face very heavy fines for non-attendance; and there is a little quote here by the Revd. Reeve who 100 years ago was the Rector of Stondon Massey. He writes in his book ‘by direction of the Canons of 1603-04 the parson and churchwardens were to present to the Bishop Ordinary every year the names of any who should be found to be favourers of any usurped or foreign power or defenders of popish and erroneous doctrine. The Byrd family of course were regular reporting for papistical leanings’.
DM: It does seem kind of brazen of Byrd who is living next door to the churchwarden to think well to hell with you I’m just not going to church because inevitably, and especially because they are in this antagonistic relationship where Byrd is actually trying to have the man evicted, it seems extraordinary obtuse of him not to think that he’s going to get into trouble.
AS: And yet he avoided trouble because he kept company with some of the most influential people in England but equally some of the most wanted people in England such as the Jesuit priests.
DM: Well, we will be taking about the plight of Catholics at this time like Byrd later in the week but these regular reports from the churchwardens have left an interesting legacy for historians they give us a clear picture of the size and make up of Byrd’s quite extensive household here in Stondon Massey. So, we have William and his wife Julian, their eldest son Christopher gradually took over the running of the farm. The house came with two hundred acres of land with a plentiful supply of timber. Byrd’s daughters Elizabeth, Rachel and Mary all married local lads. Their husbands were all yeomen and shepherds rather than gentlemen. Despite his quarrelsome relationship with his neighbours and his conspicuous recusancy we get a picture of Byrd not perhaps so much an isolated figure as fully embedded in the local society.
Stondon Massey; Byrd and the Shelley Family
Recorded on 7 June 2023 at Stondon Massey Church. First broadcast, BBC Radio 3, Friday 7 July 2023
Donald Macleod (DM): I began the week in the village of Stondon Massey and I am back here again. William Byrd lived in this hamlet in Essex from around 1594 until his death just short of 30 years later. By the time he made that very carefully considered move to this rural retreat Byrd had pretty much retired from his official duties connected with Queen Elizabeth’s Chapel Royal. But that did not mean that he’d withdrawn from an active musical life. Around me visible from the churchyard there isn’t really very much I think that Byrd would recognise. There are rolling fields, but I imagine they are very much larger than they would have been in Tudor times and farming activities going on around us. We’ve been dodging a man with a chainsaw all afternoon. I’m sure that 400 years on there are houses here that Londoners have bought themselves as country retreats within a convenient distance of the capital but far enough away from all the tensions, rivalries, political dramas and in Byrd’s time religious furore of his then public life as a gentleman of the Chapel Royal. But as we’re going to discover Byrd was never one to shy away from conflict. Even here, he created it wherever he went. Stondon rather than a haven of peace and rural tranquilly was to prove a place of energy and activity much of it fractious and abrasive.
DM: I am talking here to local history expert Andrew Smith. Andrew, the Tudor house where William Byrd lived in the village of Stondon no longer stands. It is difficult coming through the village today to get any sense of what Byrd might have seen as he walked along the same road. The church is oddly separate from the village.
Andrew Smith (AS): Yes, it is probably getting on for one and half miles from the centre of the population of Stondon Massey around what is a green and a pub these days. Byrd’s home at Stondon Place was about half a mile from here and has been rebuilt actually twice since Byrd lived in that particular house. The Times has an advert, from 1972, that says that ‘Stondon Place at Stondon Massey is a house with an unusual background. Apparently there had been a house on the site since the sixteenth century and one of the earlier properties was occupied by William Byrd the composer’.
DM: It’s great that the Estate Agent thought of putting William Byrd in as a selling point for that. So why did Byrd come to live in Stondon Massey in the first place? He is really benefiting from another man’s misfortune.
AS: Yes, William Shelley is a gentleman from Sussex, and he was detained in the Tower of London for his involvement in the Throckmorton Plot in the 1580s. Now we know that William Shelley had, shall we say, previous recusancy – he was confined as a close prisoner in the Fleet because of his intransigence to the religion – and his wife Jane Shelley complained that during her husband’s long imprisonment much of the property had been distrained and she petitioned for return of her share. You move forward then to William Byrd coming to Stondon Massey in, shall I say, semi-retirement in 1594 and we find him occupying one of the homes that Shelley inherits from his grandmother in the 1520s. Now he has been confiscated of all his property and it is the Crown who grants a short lease to William Byrd and his family at Stondon Place.
DM: When you say the Crown, we are talking here about Queen Elizabeth I.
AS: Yes, Queen Elizabeth I.
DM: So, the tables are kind of turned because when he came here first of all he tried to get the churchwarden Lolly evicted from Stondon Place and now Shelley’s wife starts that doing that the same to him.
AS: Much the same. Jane Shelley claimed that the property was in her ownership. William Shelley actually dies in 1597 but there continues at a long running dispute over the ownership of Stondon Place, and Reverend Reeve who was the Rector of Stondon Massey a 100 years ago and very keen local historian quotes this: ‘Both Mrs Shelley and Byrd were evidently born litigants and never so happy as when they were giving work to the judge and counsel. Suits of Shelley v. Byrd being varied by countersuits of Byrd v. Shelley. She encloses eight grievances against her tenant: the said William Byrd did vile and bitter words and when told he had no right to the property Byrd replied that if he could not hold it by right, he would hold in my might’. And the legal wrangling continued for over a decade.
DM: Essentially even when the court finds against Mrs Shelley and allows Byrd to go on living there the thing just rumbles on disputatiously forever so there are disputes over Byrd’s right to cut the wood on the estate and at one point, he’s taken to court for blocking the road to nearby Kelvedon Hatch.
AS: Yes, that is correct.

Stondon Massey; Byrd’s Will and Burial
Recorded on 7 June 2023 at Stondon Massey Church. First broadcast, BBC Radio 3, Friday 7 July 2023
Donald Macleod (DM): Well now I am back where I began this week in the Church of Saint Peter and Paul in the Essex village of Stondon Massey with the local historian Andrew Smith. This Church was somewhere we know Byrd generally tried to avoid. As a Catholic he was frequently fined for not attending services. But here in the vestry on the wall is a fascinating document connected with Byrd. It is a facsimile of a sheet of parchment covered in very elegant positively calligraphic handwriting, stems of a Ds all sloping backwards and the text is in English. Andrew what are we looking at?
Andrew Smith (AS): This is a photograph copy William Byrd’s will signed in November 1622. He says that he was in his 80th year. Recent evidence suggests that he was older than eighty which suggests to me that that this Last Will and Testament had been, shall we say, hanging around for a while before being signed. The Will refers to his wish to be buried in the churchyard at Stondon Massey: ‘my body to be honestly buried in that parish near unto to the place where my wife liest buried’. Julian Byrd was buried around 1608 after 40 years of marriage to William Byrd.
DM: Do you think Byrd got his way in the end, that he got his wish to be buried here?
AS: I would like to think he did. Unfortunately, the burial registers prior to 1708 don’t exist at Stondon Massey so we do not know with any certainty that he’s buried here. However, historians such as John Harley say there are no records to say that his was refused burial here, so I’d like to think on the balance of probability he is buried here.
DM: He said, and you quoted his words from the Will, that he wanted to be honestly buried by which we presume he meant according to Catholic rite. Do you think that this is likely?
AS: I think was possible. He may have had a quiet funeral maybe in the evening or night within the churchyard, but he probably was not allowed an Anglican rite of burial.
DM: Andrew Smith. Thank you so much for being my guide this week.
DM: Well, I have come out of the church into the churchyard. Byrd died at Stondon Massey on 4th July 1623 at the exceptional age for the time of eighty-three. Among the gravestones here around me I cannot see any bearing Byrd’s name, so we have no way of knowing that the wish of his to be buried here stated in his will was actually honoured. It is possible that as a Catholic in the eyes of the Anglican Church at the time he died excommunicate, so his grave was not part of the official consecrated ground. The churchwardens probably wouldn’t have allowed a Catholic to be buried in the graveyard with an inscription over his head, not even a famous Catholic like Byrd. What hasn’t been lost of course is Byrd’s remarkably rich musical legacy which continues to inspire performers and resonates strongly with us today four hundred years after his death wherever it is performed, in churches, concert halls and homes around the world, including here in Stondon this month and on Radio 3 of course.

This article was originally published in summer 2023 by the Essex Society for Archaeology and History to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the death of William Byrd. This is an updated version.

To celebrate the quatercentenary of the death of William Byrd (c.1540-1623) Stondon Massey Church held three events culminating in the ‘William Byrd Anniversary Concert’ hosted by the Stondon Singers on the actual date of his death, 4th July. An Evensong Service was held, and a history presentation entitled ‘The Life and Times of William Byrd: A Local History’ given.

William Byrd, composer, lived in Stondon Massey in semi-retirement but steadfastly refused to attend Church because he was a Catholic.

While preparing for the talk, I used the manuscript and published work of Revd. Edward Henry Lisle Reeve (1858-1936), the Rector of Stondon Massey a century ago. Reeve was an enthusiastic Byrd fan, local historian, and skilled writer.
Today, we know much more about Byrd, but understanding his true character remains challenging. Questions persist about whether he, as a recusant Catholic, was truly loyal to his monarch and patrons.
William Byrd was then as famous as his contemporary William Shakespeare. Byrd’s work served a mostly private audience and fell into obscurity for at least three centuries because of Catholic suppression, particularly following the Gunpowder Plot of 1605.

Byrd’s name appears today in many books about Elizabethan England.

Browsing in a bookshop one lunchtime I came across a book entitled ‘The Catholics’ by Roy Hattersley, the former politician turned historian, who revealed “Among the silent Catholics, who were emboldened by the execution of Edmund Campion, was the wife of William Byrd, the composer and organist in the Elizabethan Chapel Royal. She, at least according to folklore, was in the crowd that witnessed his disembowelling, and dipped her handkerchief in the martyr’s blood”.

Detective work leads from one book to another.

In the early 1580s men who had been trained abroad as Jesuit priests were entering England as missionaries. One of the most high-profile was Edmund Campion, originally ordained in the Church of England. Campion travels the country and is welcomed, in his own words, “to hear their confessions … [say] Mass, I preach; they hear with exceeding greediness and often receive the sacrament”. But this is a dangerous course of action. From 1581, celebrating mass was punishable by death.

A network of spies engaged by the authorities would secretly join invited congregations at recusant country houses. Campion made an ill-judged return visit to Lyford Grange in Berkshire two days following his first visit. It was there that George Eliot, a professional priest-hunter, heard Campion preach on the text ‘Jerusalem thou killest the prophets’. Jerusalem then, as in the later setting of William Blake’s poem, was reference to England: ‘England thou killest the prophets’ was an incendiary speech. Later that day the house was surrounded, and the following morning intruders discovered Campion hiding in the ‘priest’s hole’. He was executed on 1st December 1581.

Edmund Campion, born 25th January 1540, was the same age as Byrd and as a boy had connections with St Paul’s Cathedral where Byrd’s brothers also sang. They grew up together: “A boyhood friendship between them might explain the intensity of Byrd’s musical reaction to Campion’s martyrdom”.

Byrd’s association with Jesuit Catholics also appears in the writing of Father William Weston.

In 1585, new laws were passed making it “illegal for ordained priests to return and minister in England is extended to all laymen and women assisting in the matter”.

Meanwhile, Father Henry Garnet and Robert Southwell arrive undercover in England from Rome and are escorted to a safe house, Hurleyford in Buckinghamshire, by William Weston their Jesuit superior.

A secret welcoming party is held there in late July lasting eight days. William Weston and several unnamed friends are present as is the owner and host Richard Bold, a very skilled musician. One of the unnamed friends may have been William Fitton of Bailes who had “exchanged letters with Byrd on the subject of music”. The house has an organ, and Bold employs several instrumental musicians as well as choristers. It is an ideal retreat to sing songs, hear confession, and say Mass.

William Byrd is also present.

Father William Weston later writes “Mr Byrd, the very famous musician and organist, was among the company. Earlier he had been attached to the Queen’s chapel, where he gained a great reputation. But he had sacrificed everything for the faith – his position, the court, and all those aspirations common to men who seek preferment in royal circles as means of improving their fortune”.

Byrd certainly did not give up his post at the Chapel Royal, but stayed there until his death, albeit in semi-retirement when he moved to Stondon Massey around 1594.

In September Hurleyford is raided, its owner Richard Bold, and William Fitton, are arrested.

Investigators into the Babington Plot find a letter on the person of John Reason, Byrd’s servant, to “m[aste]r Fyton”. Walsingham’s office diary notes: “’To seek out matters against Bryde’, ‘to sende to Fra[nci]s Mylls m[aste]r Brydes note’ and ‘To sende for M[aste]r Byrde’”.

Byrd’s home in Harlington is searched in August.

Byrd is undeterred. His meeting with Henry Garnet at Hurleyford begins a friendship with the most wanted man in England. Garnet is a keen musician with a fine singing voice. Byrd gives lessons to Garnet sharing his love of music. Garnet undoubtedly reciprocated by giving Byrd instruction in theological matters.

John Stow’s chronicle of 1605 records on the same page as Campion’s martyrdom: “1582. John Paine executed at Chelmeford. John Paine priest, being indicted of high treason for words by him spoken to one Eliot, was attained, and condemned at Chelmesford on the last of March, and was there executed on the second day of Aprill”.

John Payne was arrested in Warwickshire having been detected for celebrating Mass in July 1581 at Haddon, Oxfordshire. George Eliot was his betrayer, the same man who had turned in Campion. Eliot already knew Payne was an ardent Catholic: he had met Payne while he was employed by the Petre family at Ingatestone Hall. Payne was employed as a steward to Lady Ann Petre but, in truth, was her private priest.

Payne was brought before Francis Walsingham who “could find no grounds upon which to convict Payne”. He was however found guilty on a fresh, invented charge that he attempted to enlist Eliot to murder the Queen. He protested at the gallows that “his ‘feet did never tread, his hands did never write, nor did his wit ever invent any treason against her Majesty’”.

It is said that the poet Henry Walpole attended Edmund Campion’s execution. Afterwards he wrote twenty-one verses beginning ‘Why Do I Use My Paper Ink and Pen’ naming the martyr. Byrd set the first three verses to music in 1588 without naming Campion. It was probably sung in the Petre household also in remembrance of John Payne. Maybe the additional verses were sung in secret.

It is well documented that Sir John Petre became Byrd’s patron. Byrd was a frequent visitor to Thorndon Hall, West Horndon and Ingatestone Hall and stayed at Ingatestone Hall over the Christmas season of 1589.

John Petre was a keen musician. In 1589 he commissioned an expensive instrument from a Mr Brough (costing £50) which could have been an organ or elegantly decorated virginal. Mr Robert Broughe, a frequent visitor to Thorndon Hall where he was paid £2 a year ‘to keep all my Master’s wind instruments and virginals’ was Byrd’s brother-in-law. He had married William’s sister Barbara.

Byrd in the meantime was busy composing three illegal Masses (“Mass Ordinary”). The Mass for Four Voices is completed around late 1592, and those for three and five voices by 1595. These are written in Latin and probably received their first performances in the Petre household. These were circulated secretly. The title page of the printed version is blank, and the work was not published at the time of composition.

Byrd later completes and publishes two books of Latin religious music known as the ‘Gradualia’. To the uninitiated these are merely a collection of out-of-date Latin liturgical texts. The index merely shows a list of jumbled titles. Reassembled this, and the following set, form a complete set of Latin sung liturgy for the Roman Catholic year (known as “Mass Proper”).

These volumes become treasured possessions of Byrd’s Catholic friends.

In November 1605 Charles de Ligny is arrested at an inn and sent to Newgate prison “on account of certain papistical books written by William Byrd”. This is clearly the ‘Gradualia’ because the person to whom it is dedicated is named.

In gratitude for a pay rise at the Chapel Royal Byrd dedicates the first volume to Henry Howard, Earl of Northampton. He is a privy councillor to King James I. Known to be a closet Catholic in the royal household, the King described him as a “tame duck with whom he hoped to catch many wild ones”.

There are many disaffected Catholics. In June 1605 Garnet has a strange and theological conversation with his friend Robert Catesby over the killing of innocents, and the week later celebrates the Feast of Corpus Christi “with great solemnity and music”, at Fremnalls in Downham, Essex, the home of Sir John Tyrell. Mass is said at 2am and “it is tempting to think that Byrd may have been present”. Spies are watching the house. The priests manage to escape safely but Garnet is uneasy about Robert Catesby’s behaviour to the extent that he pays another visit to Fremnalls in early July where Francis Tresham and Lord Monteagle are also present with Catesby. He urges them against “rushing headlong into mischief”.

A few days later, in mid-July Garnet is visited at his London home by Father Oswald Tesimond where he hears under seal of Confession that Catesby intends to assassinate both monarch and government by blowing up the House of Parliament. Garnet is alarmed and writes to his supervisor in Rome, “There is a risk that some private endeavour may commit treason or use force against the King”.

The detail of the “Powder Treason” is unrelated to Byrd. Early on 5th November John Johnson, alias Guy Fawkes, is found in the cellar of the House of Parliament with several barrels of gunpowder round about him ready to ignite and with no plausible alibi.

There is great national celebration that the plot is foiled. Either way this is unwelcome news for all Catholics. The terrorists are hunted down. Garnet is also looked for although it is unclear of his involvement in the plot. He is on the run and arrested in Worcestershire on 27th January 1606. He is taken to London where he is repeatedly questioned and confesses that he heard about the Plot under Confession but states he is not guilty.

Garnet’s trial on 28th March is presided over by Robert Cecil, now the Earl of Salisbury, and others including the Earl of Northampton, Byrd’s dedicatee of the ‘Gradualia’. The Jury to find Garnet “guilty of treason for not revealing the Powder Plot”.

Garnet was executed at St Paul’s Churchyard on 3rd May 1606.

Undeterred by the Gunpowder Treason Byrd publishes a second volume of ‘Gradualia’ in 1607. He dedicates the book to his patron and friend Lord Petre. Sir John Petre became baron in 1603, a title conferred on accession of King James I to the throne.

The final pieces of music in the volume are settings for the Feast of St Peter and St Paul. Set for six voices it contains a complete Mass plus two psalm settings intended for the Feast Day (29th June). However, there is also a setting for St Peter ad Vincula, St Peter in chains, commemorated on 1st August. It does not take much stretch of the imagination to align this with the chains that have bound Catholics throughout Elizabethan England.

Peter, the first Pope is also seen as a protector. For Byrd Lord Petre is also his protector and patron. Peter is the rock, and stone. Lord Petre is from Ingatestone.

It is the ultimate tribute to one of his greatest supporters and friends.

Members of the congregation at St Peter & St Paul Church in Stondon Massey are looking forward to a ‘William Byrd Festival’. A series of events will be held over two weekends in May in aid of church funds, and to bring to public attention the great Elizabethan composer who lived in Stondon for the last 30 years of his life. Money raised will go towards the creation of a new Garden of Remembrance in the churchyard (which will cost over £5000).

Leading the list of artists will be Richard Turbet, an internationally recognised expert on the life and work of William Byrd, and the Stondon Singers, a local Choir who since their formation in 1968 have specialised in the music of the renaissance composer and his contemporaries. Richard has chosen as his theme ‘William Byrd: His Essex Years’. The event will be given twice on Saturday 7 May: a matinee at 4.00pm and evening performance at 7.30pm.

Then on Saturday 14 May at 7.30pm, the Writtle Singers conducted by Christine Gwynn will give a concert entitled ‘William Byrd: Loyal Heart or Traitor?’ which explores in words and music Byrd’s connection with Queen Elizabeth I and his dangerous life as a Catholic at a time when that faith was outlawed in Britain.

Tickets for both events, priced £12.50 (children under 16, £6), are available from the William Byrd Festival, c/o The Church Office, The Vicarage, Church Street, Blackmore, Ingatestone, Essex. CM4 0RN. (Cheques payable to “Stondon Massey PCC”. Please enclose SAE). The office is usually open from 9.30am to 3.30pm on Wednesdays and Fridays.

On the two Sundays, church services will also be on a Byrd theme. On 8 May at 9.00am Stondon Church will have a Book of Common Prayer Morning Service featuring live and recorded music by Byrd, with singing supported by the church music group, Jubilate. Richard Turbet will give the address. Then on 15 May, again at 9.00am (repeated at 11.00am at the Priory Church of St Laurence Blackmore), there will be a Service of the Top 10 Favourite Hymns, as voted by the people of our two parishes and beyond. Why? Because Byrd said that “Since singing is such a good thing, I wish every man would learne to sing”.