To sing like a Byrd

William Byrd not only survived a perilous period of history as a church composer, but his music is still regularly sung today, 400 years after his death, as Henrietta Bredin reports

- Henrietta Bredin

Since singing is so good a thing, I wish all men would learne to sing.

AND women too, of course. William Byrd, the 400th anniversary of whose death is being marked this year with outpourings of his music up and down the land, must have been a good thing to have produced this little couplet. In fact, he was so keen to ‘perswade everyone to learne to sing’ that he produced a list of reasons, published in the preface to his volume Psalmes, Sonets and Songs of Sadnes and Pietie, including: ‘The exercise of singing is delightfull to Nature, & good to preserve the health of Man. It doth strengthen all the parts of the brest, & doth open the pipes. It is a singular good remedie for a stutting & stammering in the speech.’