English music publishing

Music publishing came late to England. While substantial trades developed in Venice, Paris, Nuremberg and Antwerp in the first half of the sixteenth century, virtually no music was published in London until the 1570s, apart from liturgical books with plainsong and collections of metrical psalms. It is not entirely clear why England lagged so far behind the Continent, though Queen Elizabeth tried to improve matters by granting two monopolies, one in 1559 to John Day for psalm books, and the other in 1575 for twenty-one years to Thomas Tallis and William Byrd for polyphonic music. The latter covered ‘set songe or songes in partes, either in English, Latin, Frenche, Italian, or other tongues that may serve for musicke either in Church or chamber, or otherwise to be either plaid or soonge’, as well as ‘any paper to serve for printing or pricking any songe or songes’ and ‘any printed bokes or papers of any songe or songes, or any bookes or quieres of such ruled paper imprinted’.

Tallis and Byrd used their monopoly to produce Cantiones quae ab argumento sacrae vocantur (1575), printed by Thomas Vautrollier, though it did not sell well and they appealed to Elizabeth in June 1577 for support, claiming they were out of pocket to the tune of at least 200 marks. Only two sets of part-books were issued before 1588, when Byrd, now sole holder, assigned it to the printer Thomas East. It was East who began the large-scale publication of polyphonic music, starting with Musica transalpina and Byrd's Psalms, Sonets and Songs. The Byrd–East monopoly expired in 1596, which provided openings for others.