My edition is based chiefly on the version of the piece as presented in the Byrd Edition, Vol. 11. Richard Turbet, in
William Byrd: A Research and Information Guide, writes about its problematic presentation there, as it is actually cobbled from several sources, including manuscripts dating from before
Songs of Sundrie Natures and an organ accompaniment from around 1630:
Exactly in the form printed by Byrd in SSN 1589, for performance by voices and viols, "Christ rising again" is published in BE 13, pp. 251-70. Its presentation as a verse anthem in BE 11 is somewhat factitious. The editor has observed that for publication in SSN 1589 Byrd elected to make a revision of an earlier inaugural version; the vocal parts of this original version can be found in certain manuscript sources, and it is these that are printed in BE 11. With these voice-parts, however, there are printed not the contemporary viol parts but the organ accompaniment found in Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Tenbury 791, fo. 215v. Thus the edition conflates vocal parts from the early 1580s with an organ part created, at least in respect of church use, not before the later 1620s. The church verse anthem version is conveyed in no source or date earlier than c.1630.
My editing consisted of:
1. transposing the piece back to its original notated key (it is transposed up a minor third in the Byrd Edition)
2. halving the note values
3. adding slurs and suggested ficta
4. replacing the original "Amen" with the one found in
Songs of Sundrie Natures (and adjusting the organ part accordingly).
As the work's page on CPDL says, the work exists in several forms, and indeed, these can vary considerably from the one published in
Songs of Sundrie Natures. I'll make it clear that my edition is not compatible with the other two hosted on CPDL.