Although the current talk is often of newly founded girls’ cathedral choirs and their success, there is not a recording this Christmas to touch that of Byrd: the Three Masses on the Hyperion label (CDA68038) by the boys and men of Westminster Cathedral under conductor Martin Baker. The full, rich vocal sound is radiant and assertive, as heavenly-host-like in the Mass for five parts, as it is tightly intimate in the Mass for four parts, and boyishly mellow in the Mass for three parts. The latter setting for alto tenor and bass is the most exceptional, since Westminster Cathedral has teenage altos, boys with breaking or newly broken voices, to temper the flutey falsettists. This gives the top line an easy grace, high, and chesty warmth, low. Byrd’s music blooms into timeless uni