If my complaints could passions move, is another song on a galliard—this time named after a pirate, Captain Digory Piper, who died in 1590, so like some of the other galliard songs, may have been an early work. The symmetrical rhetoric of the lyrics is matched by answering phrases in the music, but lovely touches include the passionate rising opening figure, the modulation from G minor to B flat major in the second strain where the singer addresses his lover directly, and the bass line dropping out at the opening of the third strain to give a sense of suspense.

from notes by Christopher Goodwin © 2018