BYRD, William

BYRD, William (Byrd, William) (ca. 1543-1623), composer of the Elizabethan era, one of the largest British musicians. About his childhood and infancy of information is not preserved. February 27, 1563 he was appointed organist at Lincoln Cathedral, and on 22 February 1570 - a soloist of the London Royal Chapel. Until December 1572 Byrd combined two positions, and then left the Lincoln and, apparently, he settled in London. The collection of spiritual songs Cantiones Sacrae, . published jointly with Tallis in 1575 T., . Byrd is listed as a court organist - as in his own publications of sacred music (1589, . 1591, . 1605 and 1607), but in any official list, it does not appear as an organist,
. In 1575 Byrd and Tallis obtained a license to monopolize the publication of musical works (when Tallis died in 1585, she moved to Byrd). But the monopoly was not too profitable, and in 1577 both the businessman turned to Queen Elizabeth for support. Byrd, who in 1568 married Juliana Burley, was already the father of four (or five) children and lived at the time in Harlingtone (in Middlesex). In 1593 he moved to Stondon Massey near-Ongara (Essex), where he lived until the end of days. When his wife died (after 1586), Byrd second time married. For several years he was busy with trials, asserting its alleged rights to property. But his life is further complicated by another fact: while serving in the Anglican Church, he remained a Catholic. Byrd has repeatedly appeared before the ecclesiastical court as a nonconformist, but it seems to remove him from service in the Royal Chapel nobody tried. After his death in 1623 in the official lists of the chapel, he was marked as 'the father of music' ( 'Father of Music')

. When Byrd's life following his published works: a) the Catholic church music in Latin texts: Cantiones Sacrae (jointly with Tallis), . 1575; Sacrae Cantiones, . Notebook I, . 1589; Sacrae Cantiones, . Notebook II, . 1591; Gradualia, . Notebook I, . 1605; Gradualia, . Notebook II, . 1607; three masses (for three, . four and five votes), . Publication date not set, and b) the secular vocal music and the Anglican church music in the English texts: Psalms, . sonnets, . sad and pious songs (Psalmes, . Sonets & Songs of Sadnes and pietie, . 1588), Different Song (Songs of sundrie natures, . 1589); Psalms, . Songs and Sonnets (Psalmes, . Songs and Sonnets, . 1611), c) music for the clavier: Parthenia (jointly with John Bull and Orlando Gibbons), . 1611,
. Among the extant manuscripts - Catholic motets, Anglican chants, songs, chamber music for strings, works for keyboard instruments. Catholic sacred music of Byrd, published or preserved in manuscript, apparently created for home services. The secular works from the notebooks of Psalms, sonnets and songs (1588) and some of the various songs were intended for voice and string. Lyrics to the parties strings attached, probably, then, to meet the growing public interest in the genre madrigal, as evidenced by N. Yonge published a collection of Italian madrigals with English Musica Transalpina (1588). Byrd was not madrigalistom in the strict sense: it seems more attracted to the spiritual rather than secular music. Supreme creative achievements Byrd are three Roman Catholic Mass and motets - works on Latin texts, which, by his own admission, gave him the inspiration.

Byrd died in Stondon Massey, July 4, 1623.