While this work was written during the borderline between the renaissance

and the baroque, there is no doubt that it is in the spirit of the

baroque. The structure even resembles a concerto, with discrete

parts representing the different movements, and the musical phrases

are passed from instrument to instrument in the baroque manner.

It opens with a lively vivace "movement, " and then passes to a

warm adagio, returns to a quicker pace, and finishes with a slow,

brief cadenza. When they were first introduced as dances, galliards

were often combined with other dances to create a miniature dance suite,

and here we see this somewhat reversed, one dance form, the galliard,

made into a suite itself.

© All Music Guide