The Renaissance Singers
Director, Michael Howard
Ralph Downes (organ)

Voluntary
Magnificat and Nunc dimittis for seven voices
Give the King thy judgments
O Jonathan
Gloria in excelsis
(BBC recording)
(Next programme: December 15)

This is the first of three programmes of English church music dating from the early part of the seventeenth century. The other composers to be represented are Orlando Gibbons (some of whose anthems will be sung by the Choir of King's College, Cambridge, where Gibbons was a chorister from 1596 to 1598) and Thomas Tomkins. The music by Tomkins will come from Salisbury Cathedral, where Giles Tomkins, brother of Thomas, was once organist.

The elaborate and stylish part-writing so often connected with the name of Thomas Weelkes achieves almost unparalleled intricacy in his Magnificat and Nunc dimittis, preserved m an Incomplete set of seven part-books in the library of Peterhouse, Cambridge. The work has been transcribed and reconstructed by Jeremy Noble and received its first modern performance at this year's Aldeburgh Festive (D.S.)