ABSTRACT
The death of Queen Mary brought about the end of the Sarum rite without bringing about the end of the Latin motet. The freedom from liturgical constraints allowed composers and their patrons to select their own texts. This was to hold great significance for Byrd. The situation at Lincoln during Byrd's years as Organist and Master of the Choristers is uncertain, though Aylmer's influence makes it unlikely that any hint of Catholicism was tolerated there. Some of Byrd's Latin motets of his Lincoln years, if not written for the cathedral, may have been written with an eye on the Chapel Royal. The texture of Byrd's setting is no less dense and unvarying than that of Ad Dominum cum tribularer. The repetition of the fourth section is a procedure found in Tallis's music and in some of Byrd's consort pieces and songs, but not again in Byrd's motets until Ave verum corpus, composed in the late 1590s.
