Taverner: Four Short Motets à3 (viols)

These short pieces by John Taverner (c.1490-1545) are taken from the so-called Baldwyn Commonplace Book (British Library, R.M. 24.d.2.)
Though very short, they are exquisitely crafted, and full of distinctive melodic turns, typical of English music of the first half of the sixteenth century.
All but no. 3 are straightforward cantus-firmus settings of plainsong melodies.