Download the PDF programme and song sheet/translations here. Reproduction and distribution is strictly prohibited.

Iestyn Davies and Thomas Dunford’s program of predominantly English music from the Elizabethan and Baroque eras is titled 'England’s Orpheus' because two of its composers - Purcell and Handel - were in fact given such a title by their contemporaries. Publisher Henry Playford named his collections of Purcell’s songs Orpheus Britannicus, while a cardinal-poet in early 18th-century Rome wrote verse that extolled Handel as 'the new Orpheus'. They, along with the extraordinary John Dowland of the prior century, showed the world that the vocally challenging English language could produce as mellifluous song as any other tongue. We also hear beautifully refined examples of lute music by Dowland, along with transcriptions of music originally written for other instruments by Marais and Bach.