Secret talent of Henry VIII’s last Queen

From National Post:

Katherine Parr was, in fact, a master of public relations who rallied England behind its King on the road to war, according to an academic who is preparing the first performance in 470 years of the queen’s secret musical work.

Dr. David Skinner, fellow and Osborn director of music at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, is to oversee the 21st century debut of Thomas Tallis’s Gaude gloriosa Dei Mater, with words, written in English, by Parr herself.

The lost manuscript, thought to have belonged to 16th century organist Thomas Mulliner, was used to stuff cracks in the walls of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, possibly by builders ignorant of its significance.

When it was uncovered in 1978, it was identified as being from the six-part Gaude gloriosa, which is among Tallis’s greatest works.

read more here @ National Post