CD:
Julian Bream, lute, and Sir Peter Pears, vocal: Heavenly Love, Earthly Joy: Elizabethan Lute Songs by John Dowland and Others

I am a hopeless Anglophile, have been virtually all my life, despite that incident in the 19th century when my Irish great-great-grandfather renounced, with good reason, his fealty to Queen Victoria.

I am also fascinated by the meaningful coincidence, synchronicity, a concept that still remains vague to me despite reading a fair amount of Carl Jung and attending a workshop on the topic. Just about the only thing I've taken away is that you must decide what meaning to attach to a pair or series of coincidences.

All this leads to something of a leitmotiv running through my weekend. While I was getting ready to go out Saturday, Classic Arts Showcase happened to play a clip of "Jupiter" from Holst's The Planets, as conducted a few years back by Sir Andrew Davis for the Prom at the Palace, a concert celebrating Queen Elizabeth II's golden jubilee. Some of you may be aware that the slow, majestic passage in "Jupiter" is a tune called Thaxted, which is the melody for the hymn "I Vow to Thee, My Country," a favorite of Diana, Princess of Wales. Naturally I dropped what I was doing to pause and listen.

Fast-forward to Sunday morning, when, with worse than the usual number of distractions on my mind, I went to Mass at St. Matthew's. Even on a good day the most riveting homilist has his work cut out trying to hold my attention, but it's worse still in this post-Epiphany, pre-Lenten no man's land where we currently live. And winter has arrived after every previous reprieve.

I was in a particularly bad frame of mind by the time we got to the closing hymn. Then the organist began playing, and I jumped. It was "O God Beyond All Praising," set to the tune of -- yes, once again -- Thaxted. I fought back tears, particularly through the second verse.

Then hear, O gracious Savior, accept the love we bring,
that we who know your favor may serve you as our king;
and whether our tomorrows be filled with good or ill,
we'll triumph through our sorrows and rise to bless you still:
to marvel at your beauty and glory in your ways,
and make a joyful duty our sacrifice of praise.

I took it as a sign connected to my Anglophilia and decided I'd finally see the film adaptation of Alan Bennett's The History Boys, set in the Britain of the '80s, a time when Maggie Thatcher was, as Martin Stephenson put it, still "waltzing in her middle-aged heels" -- and coincidentally the one and only time I've visited the U.K.

But fate wasn't done with me yet. The guy at the ticket booth revealed that The History Boys are still not to be seen at Dupont Circle, thanks to continuing technical problems.

That bit of news propelled me into the Dupont Circle Olsson's, where I found a happier surprise: Acorn Media has released Oliver's Travels on DVD. Back in the '90s PBS's Mystery! series ran this little gem, a combination road trip, mystery, and romance featuring an utterly charming Alan Bates, beautifully matched with Sinead Cusack as the policewoman who accompanies him on a journey across Britain to solve a disappearance. The story is graced by decidedly eclectic musical selections and beauteous British locations. Bates and Cusack are backed by fine supporting cast, including Scottish character actor Bill Paterson.

After the DVD browser, I headed for classical new releases. Last week I had more or less decided to cover the latest Naxos disc of William Alwyn's music ("Elizabethan Dances" and other works), figuring it would suit the citywide Shakespearean festival, for starters.

No such luck, as we have only the older Chandos recordings and not the Naxos. But among the new releases I found something a good deal more intriguing: RCA's newly remastered version of Heavenly Love, Earthly Joy: Elizabethan Lute Songs by John Dowland and Others. The recording, which had been out of print, features the great guitarist Julian Bream, here performing on lute, and tenor Peter Pears, Benjamin Britten's partner in music and in life.

In addition to the ever familiar works from Dowland and Thomas Morley, Heavenly Love, Earthly Joy contains works by the less well-known Thomas Ford and Philip Rosseter. There is nothing alien or outdated about its themes: love and lust, coupling and estrangement, longing and despair.

I never tire of Elizabethan music and am familiar with a number of the conceits, themes, and texts of the songs and poetry of the era. That said, it was startling and more than a little unsettling to read the texts of Heavenly Love, Earthly Joy, as well as related historical and biographical materials. In particular, the spiritual and psychological exhaustion at the heart of "Come, Heavy Sleep," apparently written while Dowland was in exile due to political intrigue, have the resonance in 2007 that they surely possessed in 1597.

Pears is of course known for his performances of Britten's works, often in roles expressly written for him, though his repertoire embraced early music and a good deal more. I've grown used to hearing soprano interpretations of Elizabethan music (by Custer LaRue of the Baltimore Consort, for example, or Emma Kirkby), but it is bracing and somehow poignant to hear a tenor's reading, especially with such a distinctive voice.

This is definitely an album to consider for your early music collection. Finding Heavenly Love, Earthly Joy takes away some of the sting of missing Paul O'Dette's free concert at the National Gallery the other week.

The clincher was when I saw the sticker on the CD and my jaw dropped. It read: "The recording that inspired Sting's chart-topping CD Songs from the Labyrinth."

I'll leave you a moment to slap your foreheads at the thought that Bream and Pears require a link to Sting as a selling point, or that the latter artist is a good match for Elizabethan music. Then I must point out that while Sting headed up the Police (the music group, not British bobbies), one of his seminal albums was entitled Synchronicity.

Britain. Two different Elizabethan eras. Patriotism. Meaningful coincidences.