It seems likely that it is the small quantity of works by Christopher Tye that have survived that has prevented him from being better known than he is, for the merits of his surviving works hardly account for his obscurity.

Most of Christopher Tye's music is pre-Reformation. His music has much of the free, even riotous counterpoint of other early Tudor masses by contemporaries such as John Taverner. He does, however, also make some use of the imitative counterpoint more fashionable on the Continent.

We have an interesting comparison available between the Western Wind masses written by Christopher Tye and his two contemporaries John Taverner and John Sheppard. While secular tunes were often used as thematic material for mass setting by continental composers, there are only three English masses that do so. In each case, it is the same secular tune that is used, namely the popular song "The Western Wind." Each setting is cast in the form of a theme and variations where one voice sings the song's melody and the other voices sing counter-melodies. I personally find Sheppard's setting by far the least interesting of the three, mostly because the melody is invariably in the top line, though the Agnus Dei is a beautiful conclusion. It seems that Christopher Tye wrote his "Western Wind" mass as an answer to Taverner's. Tye matched John Taverner's scoring of Treble, Mean, Counter Tenor & Bass. ( In Tudor times, the treble part was sung by boys with higher voices, the mean by boys with lower voices.) Part of the richness of Taverner's setting comes from his moving the melody around to various voices, although the top part often carries it. As it turned out, every part got the melody except for the Mean. Tye reversed this by keeping the melody in the Mean part throughout. Since the mean is the top part only in a few of the sections with reduced scoring, it is not monotonous in the way Sheppard's setting is. Indeed, the soaring counter-melodies sung by the trebles are thrilling.

Christopher Tye's Euge Bone Mass is one of the great masterpieces of English Renaissance music. It is scored for six voices with two tenor and two bass parts so that it has a deep rich sound to it. The many lower voices are balanced, however, but a high, soaring treble line. Two main motifs form much of the thematic basis of the mass which combines much imitation with free counterpoint in a tight structure. As with much Tudor music, there is a tendency for the voice parts to keep tripping over one another. The musical texture is bright and confident. Strong, vigorous rhythms add to the affirmative affect of the music. The Agnus Dei is especially noteworthy. It has no less than three settings of the first phrase plus a setting of the final "Dona Nobis Pacem." Although it has been suggested that Tye intended for a choir director to choose one or two of the settings, the four together are particularly satisfying. After the first setting, scored for full choir, the second setting is scored movingly for lower voices and the third for upper voices. After this contrast, the final Agnus Dei for full choir forms a climax to what has gone before.

The motet Peccavimus cum patribus nostris is one of the greatest extended works of the period. It is a Jesus antiphon of a highly penitential character. Its mood is as dark as that of the Euge Bone mass is bright. Tye takes full advantage of the contrasts in color available by reducing the scoring of extended sections of such a long work. As a result, there are two long sections for lower voices whose pitch makes the music suitably mournful. The second of these lower voice sections precedes the conclusion. These sections for lower voices are each followed by dramatic entrances by the trebles singing at the top of their range. In each instance, especially in the conclusion, the full scoring allows for building up to an intense climax of the supplication to Jesus for mercy. As is often the case with music in a "minor-key" mode, the motifs don't offer a strong sense of closure, that is of landing on "home plate." The music, then, tends to convey the sense that there is no grounded security in our own humanity. We can only express our emptiness before God and pray that God might fill it.