Weep, weep, oh Walsingham

What connects an English Catholic composer, a sanctuary in Norfolk, the Anglican Church, and a series of variations for keyboard? Returning to the formula he tested earlier, the concert with commentary, Andreas Staier invites us into the musical universe of an English composer of singular character, and seeks to answer a few puzzling enigmas … 

This first session is centred around Byrd’s most majestic work: Walsingham, a set of variations written on the theme of a famous Elizabethan popular ballade, whose name stems from the Catholic pilgrims’ site of Norfolk destroyed by the Anglicans in 1538. Did Byrd, who converted to Catholicism at the age of 30, not fill his score with coded musical allusions to turn it into a secret and refractory profession of faith? “Weep, weep, oh Walsingham!” Find out the answer in April 2020...