Most of Byrd’s music dates from the long reign of Elizabeth I (1558-1603), when, after more than 20 years of religious turmoil, England finally settled as a Protestant nation. While one might expect Byrd to have concentrated his artistic efforts on music for the reformed church, it is clear from his surviving output that he had a different agenda in mind when putting pen to paper. The statistics are revealing. Owing to Byrd’s long association with the Chapel Royal and powerful patrons, close to half of his industrious output is devoted to secular and courtly entertainment (keyboard music, consort songs, madrigals, sonnets, etc.), while the remainder is for the church. Byrd composed close to 200 Latin works (most of which survive in contemporary printed editions) plus three settings of the Mass Ordinary, while his music for the English church (not a note printed in the composer’s lifetime) amounts to only four services, three settings of Preces and Responses, a short Litany, and around two dozen anthems. Indeed, if one were to record Byrd’s surviving sacred music, the Latin works would fit on to around 13 or 14 CDs, while one would be pressed to fill four discs with the English material.