Over the past 30 years Harry Christophers and The Sixteen have carved out an elegant niche for themselves right at the heart of the early music movement. Their annual Choral Pilgrimage – now in its tenth year – has become an integral part of the ensemble’s mythology, exporting their ever-popular blend of old music and young voices to England’s provinces, returning the repertoire to the buildings for which it was intended.

This year’s was a home-grown programme, celebrating the music of Tudor greats Tallis, Byrd and Sheppard. Built around two epic masterpieces – Sheppard’s Media Vita and Byrd’s Infelix Ego – the concert sought to display not only the technical but the emotional range of these composers, balancing the brooding meditation of these two pieces with the joyous outpourings of Byrd’s Haec Dies and Laudibus in Sanctis, and the contemplative calm of Tallis’s Jesu Salvator Saeculi.

It was a huge task, and one that while tantalisingly within the group’s grasp, remained on Friday ever so slightly out of reach. For clarity and tone-colour the group are – to my mind – unmatched by any rivals, achieving an unforced fullness of sound and ringing warmth that made Laudibus In Sanctis a joy. Intelligent articulation and phrasing was constant throughout, yet the concert was marred by a slightly one-size-fits-all approach to the dynamics and characterisation.

Such a varied programme on paper implied a series of contrasting sound-worlds, yet in practice tended to default to a workmanlike approach. This may have been due to the rather baffling programme order, which opted for shock-and-awe lurches between moods rather than a single emotional trajectory.

This was a good concert by a good ensemble that could have been great. As Christophers himself acknowledges in his programme notes, this is truly exceptional music: music that deserves no less from its performers.