Par SHEPPARD JOHN. Edited by David Chadd The music of John Sheppard, who was about ten years younger than Tallis, dates from the uncertain times of the Reformation and the reigns of Edward VI and Mary. Perhaps his most impressive work is to be found in his cantus firmus responds, which reflect the considerable musical importance that some choral foundations attached to Matins and Vespers on special feast-days in the last decades of the Sarum rite./ Recueil / Chorale

Par SHEPPARD JOHN. Edited by Nicholas Sandon Taverner and Tye are the predominant influences in these works. The 6-part Mass Cantate is taken from the Oxford partbooks. The source for The Western Wind Mass, The Frences Mass, the Mass Be not afraid, and the Plainsong Mass for a Mean, all in four parts, is the so-called 'Gyffard' partbooks (British Library Add. MSS 17802-5), which are now known to have been copied after Elizabeth’s accession for a Catholic patron, Dr Philip Gyffard, Fellow of Merton College, Oxford./ Recueil / Chorale

Par TEMPERLEY N.. Both a dedicated carol singer and an authority on the history of English music, Nicholas Temperley here offers a unique book of 37 carols dating from the fifteenth century to the present. For over fifty years he has sung, edited and composed carols each Christmas, and in Christmas is Coming the fruit of his enthusiasm is combined with his wealth of knowledge to produce an outstanding and original new collection. As John Rutter observes in his Foreword, the book does not pointlessly duplicate what can be found in many other carol books, but has a personality and purpose of its own. Twenty-two fresh and practical arrangements include carols from Austria, France, Germany, Mexico, Poland and the USA, alongside music both rare and familiar from the rich heritage of the English carol tradition. As well as eight of his personal favourites, from J. S. Bach to Charles Ives, the author includes seven new compositions of his own, settings of medieval and traditional texts that reveal his skill as a choral composer whose command of style ranges from the humorous to the profound. In addition to sample programmes and translations, there are invaluable notes on the performance and history of individual items, plus an historical summary of the genre as a whole: everything in fact to make Christmas is Coming an indispensable companion for singers who wish to enrich the seasonal repertoire for concerts, churches and traditional Yuletide carolling./ Recueil / Chorale