Secret Catholic Worship Under the Tudors

Kendra Comstock, Soprano • Charles Iner, Lute
Sunday . 1 June | 2.00 pm | Cathedral of the Holy Cross | Blessed Sacrament Chapel
Freewill offering at the door | 17 an dunder FREE

A Pilgrimes Solace: Secret Worship Under The Tudors features various sacred and instrumental works by two composers of Renaissance England, William Byrd and John Dowland, who lived as Roman Catholics in a time when Catholics were persecuted in England under Henry VIII and Elizabeth I, following Henry’s schism with the Pope during the protestant reformation. Roman Catholics in England at that time were subject to various forms of oppression, from fines for not attending Church of England religious services, to (as was the case for Dowland) being passed over for career advancement, to charges of treason. Due to these confinements, Catholics in the England of the 16th- and 17th-centuries were forced to find religious outlets in the form of secret masses held in private homes by Jesuit priests smuggled in from the continent, or, in the case of these composers, thinly veiled expressions of their oppression in their artistic works. For example, Byrd’s musical setting of a text like “arise o Lord, why sleepest thou?” from Psalm 44 takes on added meaning in the context of a composer working under an authoritarian regime using religion as a means to consolidate wealth and power.

Praised for her “clear melodic core” and a “sound that rejoices in the beauty of natural vowels” (Boston Music Intelligencer), soprano Kendra Comstock is a Boston-based performer and teacher.

Charles Iner is a Boston-based lutenist, guitarist, educator, and basso continuo performer. He received an MM in Historical Performance at Boston University, where he was awarded a departmental award for outstanding excellence in 2020, and a BA in Music Performance from Benedictine College.

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