Robert Dow was a Londoner and an Oxford man who copied the partbooks named after him in the 1580s. It is poignant that these were probably still work-in-progress at the time of his death, aged 35, in 1588, for they present a varied overview of the musical landscape of Elizabethan England: clearly, a discriminating musician. The Rose Consort of Viols here join forces with the young Oxford-based Marian Consort to present, in turn, a cross-section of the partbooks’ contents. It’s a well-designed programme in which the two groups alternate, only partly combining when the viols accompany a vocal soloist.

The Rose Consort need no introduction and their choice of material includes some continental texted pieces, some rather fine and rarely heard In nomines by Robert White and Nicholas Strogers (respectively staid and quirky), lighter fare being represented by Vincenzo Ruffo’s jaunty La gamba and Byrd’s La verginella. The Marian Consort’s contributions are cleanly and calmly delivered, though offering less scope for variety than the instrumental numbers. Robert White’s extended motet Justus es, Domine sees them near their best, though not all the longer pieces fare quite as well. At times, calm ebbs towards caution, when one would have liked them to take more risks or at least a more positive approach to the shaping of phrases and lines. But the concluding Ave Maria by Robert Parsons is superb, the final ‘Amen’ attaining to genuine emotion but without the saccharine reverence that this much-recorded piece can attract.