Byrd's deep Catholic faith probably kept him enamored of the idea of the human voice as the truest of musical instruments, which may be why he focused on music that included, or was exclusively for, the voice. But the trouble he did take with instrumental music was not energy wasted. Byrd ignored several of the instrumental genres being cultivated in England in his time—including some of the most popular ones—but in all of those he did contribute to, he set new standards of quality for his peers. Most of the works are fantasias, dances, sets of variations, and instrumental settings of cantus firmi. He wrote relatively little music for viol consort alone, which is what makes a piece such as Prelude and Ground especially noteworthy. He did compose a famous suite of five cantus firmus settings for viol consort, In Nomine, which can now be heard as the records of a brilliant young composer schooling himself in composing for the instruments. The In Nomine pieces seem to have come from Byrd's twenties and from the first to the fifth, enormous musical progress is made. Prelude and Ground, on the other hand, was composed much later when the composer had evidently matured and stands among Byrd's relatively few consort pieces as considered second only to his own accepted masterpiece of the genre Browning. All of Byrd's viol music is found in manuscript sources, simply consisting of textless part-music for unspecified instruments; it's presumed from historical research, and certain idiomatic features, that the instruments intended were viols. Prelude and Ground is one of two grounds left by him, the other being Browning itself. A ground is essentially a contrapuntal fantasia over a repeating melody, called the ground. Prelude and Ground is built on an elaborate, wide-ranging bass melody. In a relatively short time, 11 variations are spelled out over this bass with great physical vigor, clarity, and technical ingenuity. The soberly lyrical, songlike prelude is brief and the music then nimbly steps over into a dance-like scenario, a rhythmic situation enlivened with dotted notes and delicate syncopations between the viols, upon which Byrd hangs his constantly self-renewing melodic inventions. Within each longer set of variations, the piece accumulates in lucid little periods. With each of these, Byrd creates a slight but very perceptible shift in mood as a new set of contrapuntal shapes is unpacked. Prelude and Ground has a mildly self-congratulatory cleverness, easily forgiven, and moves through brilliant dance-like passages toward the lovely conclusion in a vivid bloom of notey melodic glee.

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