Richard Baker tells the stories behind 1,000 years of great music.
Elizabeth I of England was a vain and charismatic queen who liked to be reassured that she could play the keyboard better than Mary, Queen of Scots, and had madrigals written in her honour, like The Triumphs of Oriana. Hers was a golden age of prosperity, international influence and artistic life, yet minstrels could be penalised as vagrants - branded for a first offence, executed for a third.