The Battle for God's Music

[ardcarp]

On BBC4 tonight at 7pm, the ever present presenter Lucy Worsley presents a programme called Elizabeth 1's Battle for God's Music.



Lucy Worsley investigates the story of the most remarkable creation from the tumultuous and violent era known as the Reformation - choral evensong.

Henry VIII loved religious music, but he loved power more - when he instigated his English Reformation he dramatically split from the ancient Catholic church that controlled much of his country. But in doing so set into motion changes that would fundamentally transform the religious music he loved.

Following Elizabeth I's personal story, Lucy recounts how she and her two siblings were shaped by the changes their father instigated. Elizabeth witnessed both her radically puritan brother Edward bring church music to the very brink of destruction and the terrifying reversals made by her sister Mary - which saw her thrown in the Tower of London forced to beg for her life.

When Elizabeth finally took power she was determined to find a religious compromise - she resurrected the Protestant religion of her brother, but kept the music of her beloved father - music that she too adored. And it was in the evocative service of choral evensong that her ideas about religious music found their ultimate expression.

This may be a repeat. Expect Ms Worsley to appear dressed up - inter alia - as the monarch herself, let alone Henry 8 and William Byrd.

[oddoneout]

A recent LW programme didn't involve dressing up, indeed she kept to the same outfit for most of it, so this might go the same way. Either way I'm not overly bothered, there's usually enough of interest to me to offset the silliness.

[ardcarp]

Long Wave radio?

[oddoneout]

Long Wave radio?

Oh I say, that's not cricket sir!
It was a repeat, from 2017 I think - I almost missed the xx etc at the end. I notice that according to the schedule listing (BBC's own) the only music played was Teddy Bear's Picnic... As the only bit of information that wasn't also available on the freeview listing I'm not sure it was worth it.

[Vox Humana]

"Exactly what you would have heard when Evensong was in its infancy in the sixteenth century", announced Ms Worsley, referring to a Matins responsory by Taverner. And that wasn't the only glitch in a sloppy script, which implied that Taverner's piece was written in the 1590s and the dissolution of the monasteries put an end to plainsong. Perhaps neither of those things was quite what the script meant to say, but the statement that you had to go to a cathedral to hear polyphony was very definitely wrong. And I'd query whether Tallis's four-part mass owed its simplicity to the reformation: one could argue that it has more affinity with the earlier simple polyphonic idioms sometimes employed to enable inexperienced singers to sing polyphony. But of course I'm just being very picky. Overall, it was a very enjoyable and often informative programme and the singing was excellent. I positvely drooled at the sight of the Ranworth antiphonal. Is this priceless manuscript still kept in the church? It certainly was when I visited not too many years ago.

[oddoneout]

"Exactly what you would have heard when Evensong was in its infancy in the sixteenth century", announced Ms Worsley, referring to a Matins responsory by Taverner. And that wasn't the only glitch in a sloppy script, which implied that Taverner's piece was written in the 1590s and the dissolution of the monsteries put an end to plainsong. Perhaps neither of those things was quite what the script meant to say, but the statement that you had to go to a cathedral to hear polyphony was very definitely wrong. And I'd query whether Tallis's four-part mass owed its simplicity to the reformation: one could argue that it has more affinity with the earlier simple polyphonic idioms sometiomes employed to enable inexperienced singers to sing polyphony. But of course I'm just being very picky. Overall, it was a very enjoyable and often informative programme and the singin was excellent. I positvely drooled at the sight of the Ranworth antiphonal. Is this priceless manuscript still keep in the church? It certainly was when I visited not too many years ago.

This suggests it is although it's not absolutely clear, but there are some lovely images of the illuminations

https://www.ranworthchurch.com/antiphoner

[Vox Humana]

This suggests it is although it's not absolutely clear, but there are some lovely images of the illuminations
https://www.ranworthchurch.com/antiphoner

Many thanks for that. Utterly beautiful!

[oddoneout]

Many thanks for that. Utterly beautiful!

Bit more here which clarifies that it is on display http://www.norfolkchurches.co.uk/ranworth/ranworth.htm and interesting information about the other treasures.
When I was a very young child Easter was several times a Broads holiday, part of which was mooring at Ranworth for my mother to attend church. As a result it is fixed in my mind as a thatched building which in fact it hasn't been for decades! The thatch went up in flames in 1965 so I imagine the lead roof dates from after that. I don't remember the inside of the church at all - it's possible my father was left minding his children for once.

[Serial_Apologist]

"Exactly what you would have heard when Evensong was in its infancy in the sixteenth century", announced Ms Worsley, referring to a Matins responsory by Taverner. And that wasn't the only glitch in a sloppy script, which implied that Taverner's piece was written in the 1590s and the dissolution of the monsteries put an end to plainsong. Perhaps neither of those things was quite what the script meant to say, but the statement that you had to go to a cathedral to hear polyphony was very definitely wrong. And I'd query whether Tallis's four-part mass owed its simplicity to the reformation:

I thought as much, although not personally knowledgeable about C16 music: I got the impression that the error was more-or-less rectified during the course of the remainder of the programme. What equally fascinates me is how those "simplified" Tallis settings acquire a prophetic sense of periodicy in how the music moves forward to harmonic resolutions in distinct sections that give a sense of "arrival" quite distinctive of the "timelessness" of overlapping interweaving polyphonic lines, which seems to me analogous with the philosophical move towards the literal represented in an important aspect of the Reformation, which in turn would become the foundation for future fundamentalist movements in Christianity. I dare say future programmes dealing with the Baroque would have had more to say about this aspect of "western" [sic} music's future idiomatic and formal development carrying forward beyond the church and into the concert hall/opera house.

one could argue that it has more affinity with the earlier simple polyphonic idioms sometimes employed to enable inexperienced singers to sing polyphony. But of course I'm just being very picky. Overall, it was a very enjoyable and often informative programme and the singing was excellent. I positvely drooled at the sight of the Ranworth antiphonal. Is this priceless manuscript still kept in the church? It certainly was when I visited not too many years ago.

An excellent programme in all other respects, I agree.

[ardcarp]

Call me stupid, but what had The Teddy Bears' Picnic intro got to do with the programme? Did I miss something?

[cat]

Call me stupid, but what had The Teddy Bears' Picnic intro got to do with the programme? Did I miss something?

At the intro we were asked to conjure up a quintessential English scene as Lucy was flicking through a picture book depicting croquet and a picnic. The editor presumably saw this and typed "picnic" into their music database search function and 'The Teddy Bears' Picnic was the first result. This can get quite tedious in some documentaries as we're subjected to an endless parade of unrelated background music clips based solely on certain keywords uttered by the narrator. However I thought it worked quite well here as they suddenly defied expectations and flipped straight to the choir at Hampton Court.

[Pulcinella]

We quite enjoyed it (though got a bit annoyed with Lucy always having to try her hand/voice at everything!), but thought that the message was a bit mixed, with rather too much concentration on the Mass (Byrd and Tallis) rather than on the evolution of Evensong in its own right. And wouldn't Mattins have been equally important in the Chapels Royal in those days?