Constant Penelope

This setting of a poignant English text is by William Byrd, a master of Renaissance part-music. The piece is for ATTBB choir, a rich consort of male voices. The words, translated from Ovid's Heroides, express the lament of Penelope, wife of the absent Odysseus, who longs for her husband's return and rails against his prolonged absence. She feels abandoned, envying the women of Troy, for whom her husband's conquest brought renown, while she is left alone, cold, and counting the days. Byrd's music would have captured the emotional weight of her complaint, creating a dramatic and expressive miniature.