Spem in alium
Encyclopedia
Spem in alium is a forty-part Renaissance
Renaissance
The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...

 motet
Motet
In classical music, motet is a word that is applied to a number of highly varied choral musical compositions.-Etymology:The name comes either from the Latin movere, or a Latinized version of Old French mot, "word" or "verbal utterance." The Medieval Latin for "motet" is motectum, and the Italian...

 by Thomas Tallis
Thomas Tallis
Thomas Tallis was an English composer. Tallis flourished as a church musician in 16th century Tudor England. He occupies a primary place in anthologies of English church music, and is considered among the best of England's early composers. He is honoured for his original voice in English...

, composed circa 1570 for eight choirs of five voices each. The sacred text has been used as a basis for other choral settings, such as a 4-part setting by Colebault and the Mass by Palestrina based on it. Along with Gregorio Allegri
Gregorio Allegri
Gregorio Allegri was an Italian composer of the Roman School and brother of Domenico Allegri; he was also a priest and a singer. He lived mainly in Rome, where he would later die.-Life:...

's 'Miserere
Miserere (Allegri)
Miserere, full name "Miserere mei, Deus" by Italian composer Gregorio Allegri, is a setting of Psalm 51 composed during the reign of Pope Urban VIII, probably during the 1630s, for use in the Sistine Chapel during matins, as part of the exclusive Tenebrae service on Wednesday and Friday of Holy...

' this piece by Tallis is regarded as one of the pinnacles of Renaissance
Renaissance
The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...

 Polyphony
Polyphony
In music, polyphony is a texture consisting of two or more independent melodic voices, as opposed to music with just one voice or music with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords ....

.

History

The early history of the work is obscure. It is listed in a catalogue of the library at Nonsuch Palace
Nonsuch Palace
Nonsuch Palace was a Tudor royal palace, built by Henry VIII in Surrey, England; it stood from 1538 to 1682–3. Its ruins are in Nonsuch Park.- Background :Nonsuch Palace in Surrey was perhaps the grandest of Henry VIII's building projects...

 made in 1596 as "a song of fortie partes, made by Mr. Tallys." The earliest surviving manuscripts are those prepared in 1610 for the investiture of Henry Frederick
Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales
Henry Frederick Stuart, Prince of Wales was the elder son of King James I & VI and Anne of Denmark. His name derives from his grandfathers: Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley and Frederick II of Denmark. Prince Henry was widely seen as a bright and promising heir to his father's throne...

, the son of James I
James I of England
James VI and I was King of Scots as James VI from 24 July 1567 and King of England and Ireland as James I from the union of the English and Scottish crowns on 24 March 1603...

, as Prince of Wales
Prince of Wales
Prince of Wales is a title traditionally granted to the heir apparent to the reigning monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the 15 other independent Commonwealth realms...

.

A 1611 letter written by the law student Thomas Wateridge contains the following anecdote:

In Queen Elizabeth's time yeere was a songe sen[t] into England of 30 parts (whence the Italians obteyned ye name to be called ye Apices of the world) wch beeinge songe mad[e] a heavenly Harmony. The Duke of — bearinge a great love to Musicke asked whether none of our Englishmen could sett as good a songe, and Tallice beinge very skilfull was felt to try whether he would undertake ye matter, wch he did and made one of 40 partes wch was songe in the longe gallery at Arundell house, wch so farre surpassed ye other that the Duke, hearinge yt songe, tooke his chayne of Gold from his necke & putt yt about Tallice his necke and gave yt him.


Allowing the "30" to be a mistake, the Italian song referred to is either the 40-part motet Ecce beatam lucem or the 40-60 voice mass Missa sopra Ecco sì beato giorno
Missa sopra Ecco sì beato giorno
The Missa sopra Ecco sì beato giorno is a musical setting of the Ordinary of the Mass, for 40 and 60 voices, by Florentine Renaissance composer Alessandro Striggio. It probably dates from 1565–6, during the reign of his employer Cosimo I de' Medici. Lost for more than 400 years, it was recently...

, both by Alessandro Striggio
Alessandro Striggio
Alessandro Striggio was an Italian composer, instrumentalist and diplomat of the Renaissance. He composed numerous madrigals as well as dramatic music, and by combining the two, became the inventor of madrigal comedy...

, who is known to have visited London in June 1567 after a trip through Europe during which he arranged other performances of Missa sopra Ecco sì beato giorno.

This account is consistent with the catalogue entry at Nonsuch Palace
Nonsuch Palace
Nonsuch Palace was a Tudor royal palace, built by Henry VIII in Surrey, England; it stood from 1538 to 1682–3. Its ruins are in Nonsuch Park.- Background :Nonsuch Palace in Surrey was perhaps the grandest of Henry VIII's building projects...

: Arundel House
Arundel House
Arundel House was a town-house or palace located between the Strand and the Thames, near St Clement Danes.It was originally the town house of the Bishops of Bath and Wells, during the Middle Ages. In 1539 it was given to William Fitzwilliam, Earl of Southampton...

 was the London home of Henry FitzAlan, 19th Earl of Arundel
Henry FitzAlan, 19th Earl of Arundel
Henry FitzAlan, 19th Earl of Arundel was an English nobleman, who over his long life assumed a prominent place at the court of all the later Tudor sovereigns, probably the only person to do so.-Court career:...

; Nonsuch Palace was his country residence. Nonsuch possessed an octagonal banqueting hall, which in turn had four first-floor balconies: it can be speculated that Tallis designed the music to be sung not only in the round, but with four of the eight five-part choirs singing from the balconies.

The Duke of the letter is thought to be Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk
Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk
Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk, KG, Earl Marshal was an English nobleman.Norfolk was the son of the poet Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey. He was taught as a child by John Foxe, the Protestant martyrologist, who remained a lifelong recipient of Norfolk's patronage...

, and if so (and if the anecdote is trustworthy) the Duke's execution in 1572 gives a latest date for the composition of the work. Other historians, doubting the anecdote, have suggested that the first performance was on the occasion of Elizabeth
Elizabeth I of England
Elizabeth I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana, or Good Queen Bess, Elizabeth was the fifth and last monarch of the Tudor dynasty...

's fortieth birthday in 1573. Other dates have been suggested, including the possibility that it was composed years earlier for Mary Tudor
Mary I of England
Mary I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from July 1553 until her death.She was the only surviving child born of the ill-fated marriage of Henry VIII and his first wife Catherine of Aragon. Her younger half-brother, Edward VI, succeeded Henry in 1547...

, Elizabeth's predecessor.

An early score of the work currently resides at the Bodleian Library
Bodleian Library
The Bodleian Library , the main research library of the University of Oxford, is one of the oldest libraries in Europe, and in Britain is second in size only to the British Library...

, Oxford, where it is part of an exhibition detailing 1000 years of British choral music.

Qualities

The motet is laid out for eight choirs of five voices (soprano, alto, tenor, baritone and bass). It is most likely that Tallis intended his singers to stand in a horseshoe shape. Beginning with a single voice from the first choir, other voices join in imitation, each in turn falling silent as the music moves around the eight choirs. All forty voices enter simultaneously for a few bars, and then the pattern of the opening is reversed with the music passing from choir eight to choir one. There is another brief full section, after which the choirs sing in pairs,
throwing the sound across the space between them. Finally all voices join for the culmination of the work. Though composed in imitative style and occasionally homophonic, its individual vocal lines act quite freely within its fairly simple harmonic framework, allowing for an astonishing number of individual musical ideas to be sung during its ten-to-twelve minute performance time. The work is a study in contrasts: the individual voices sing and are silent in turns, sometimes alone, sometimes in choirs, sometimes calling and answering, sometimes all together, so that, far from being a monotonous mess, the work is continually presenting new ideas to the listener. The effect on the listener of the sheer number of ideas contained in the work, compounded with the unusual performance practice of surrounding the audience with performers, can be overwhelming.

The work is not often performed, as it requires at least forty singers capable of meeting its technical demands. The discipline that comes with performing the masterpiece is highlighted in the importance of the conductor and the performers alike. Whilst performers are distributed throughout a venue, the conductor becomes truly the hub for the piece throughout, as often there is little or no visibility between the performers, and a large venue will present acoustical challenges, not regarded with traditional choirs co-located.

Latin

The original Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...

 text of the motet is from a response (at Matins
Matins
Matins is the early morning or night prayer service in the Roman Catholic, Anglican, Lutheran and Eastern Orthodox liturgies of the canonical hours. The term is also used in some Protestant denominations to describe morning services.The name "Matins" originally referred to the morning office also...

, for the 3rd Lesson, during the V week of September), in the Sarum Rite
Sarum Rite
The Sarum Rite was a variant of the Roman Rite widely used for the ordering of Christian public worship, including the Mass and the Divine Office...

, adapted from the Book of Judith. Today the response appears in the Divine Office of the Latin rite in the Office of Readings (formerly called Matins) following the first lesson on Tuesday of the 29th Week of the Year.
Spem in alium nunquam habui praeter in te
Deus Israel
qui irasceris
et propitius eris
et omnia peccata hominum in tribulatione dimittis
Domine Deus
Creator coeli et terrae
respice humilitatem nostram


There is no early manuscript source giving the underlay for the Latin text: the 1610 copies give the underlay for the English contrafactum
Contrafactum
In vocal music, contrafactum refers to "the substitution of one text for another without substantial change to the music"....

 "Sing and glorify" (see below), with the Latin words given at the bottom.

English translation

I have never put my hope in any other but in You,
O God of Israel
who can show both anger
and graciousness,
and who absolves all the sins of suffering man
Lord God,
Creator of Heaven and Earth
be mindful of our lowliness

English contrafactum

Sung at the 1610 investiture of Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales
Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales
Henry Frederick Stuart, Prince of Wales was the elder son of King James I & VI and Anne of Denmark. His name derives from his grandfathers: Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley and Frederick II of Denmark. Prince Henry was widely seen as a bright and promising heir to his father's throne...

.
Sing and glorify heaven's high Majesty,
Author of this blessed harmony;
Sound divine praises
With melodious graces;
This is the day, holy day, happy day,
For ever give it greeting,
Love and joy, heart and voice meeting:
Live Henry princely and mighty,
Harry live in thy creation happy.

Renditions

Recordings include those by the Choir of Winchester Cathedral
Winchester Cathedral
Winchester Cathedral at Winchester in Hampshire is one of the largest cathedrals in England, with the longest nave and overall length of any Gothic cathedral in Europe...

; the Tallis Scholars
Tallis Scholars
The Tallis Scholars are a British vocal ensemble normally consisting of two singers per part, with a core group of ten singers.Formed in 1973 by their director Peter Phillips, they specialise in performing a cappella sacred vocal music written during the Renaissance by composers from all over Europe...

, the National Youth Choir of Great Britain, the Oxford Camerata; the Choirs of King's
King's College, Cambridge
King's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge, England. The college's full name is "The King's College of our Lady and Saint Nicholas in Cambridge", but it is usually referred to simply as "King's" within the University....

 and St John's
St John's College, Cambridge
St John's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college's alumni include nine Nobel Prize winners, six Prime Ministers, three archbishops, at least two princes, and three Saints....

 Colleges, Cambridge; The Sixteen
The Sixteen
The Sixteen are a choir and period instrument orchestra; founded by Harry Christophers in 1979.The group's special reputation for performing early English polyphony, masterpieces of the Renaissance, bringing fresh insights into Baroque and early Classical music and a diversity of 20th century...

; The Clerkes of Oxenford; Cantillation; Huelgas Ensemble
Huelgas Ensemble
The Huelgas Ensemble is a Belgian early music group formed by the Flemish conductor Paul Van Nevel in 1971. The group's performance and extensive discography focuses on renaissance polyphony...

; Philip Cave's Magnificat; and, most recently (2006), by the British male a capella group, the King's Singers
King's Singers
The King's Singers is a British a cappella vocal ensemble who celebrated their 40th anniversary in 2008. Their name recalls King's College in Cambridge, England, where the group was formed by six choral scholars in 1968. In the United Kingdom, their popularity peaked in the 1970s and early 1980s...

. This recording is particularly noteworthy, since the group is composed of just six men: all forty parts are performed by these six via multitracking
Multitrack recording
Multitrack recording is a method of sound recording that allows for the separate recording of multiple sound sources to create a cohesive whole...

. The Kronos Quartet
Kronos Quartet
Kronos Quartet is a string quartet founded by violinist David Harrington in 1973 in Seattle, Washington. Since 1978, the quartet has been based in San Francisco, California. The longest-running combination of performers had Harrington and John Sherba on violin, Hank Dutt on viola, and Joan...

 has also recorded an instrumental version of the motet on their album Black Angels
Black Angels (album)
Black Angels is a 1990 album by the string quartet Kronos Quartet. It includes, and was named after the George Crumb's 1970 composition Black Angels; the composition which had inspired David Harrington to found the Kronos Quartet in 1973....

. Cellist Peter Gregson has also multitracked
Multitrack recording
Multitrack recording is a method of sound recording that allows for the separate recording of multiple sound sources to create a cohesive whole...

 Spem in Alium, performing all 40 parts on one cello
Cello
The cello is a bowed string instrument with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is a member of the violin family of musical instruments, which also includes the violin, viola, and double bass. Old forms of the instrument in the Baroque era are baryton and viol .A person who plays a cello is...

.

Another version of this motet is featured in Janet Cardiff
Janet Cardiff
Janet Cardiff is a Canadian installation artist. Born in Brussels, Ontario in 1957 Cardiff studied at Queen's University where she graduated in 1980. She also studied at the University of Alberta and graduated in 1983. She works in collaboration with her partner George Bures Miller. Cardiff and...

's Forty-Part Motet (2001), an exhibition which is part of the permanent collection of the National Gallery of Canada
National Gallery of Canada
The National Gallery of Canada , located in the capital city Ottawa, Ontario, is one of Canada's premier art galleries.The Gallery is now housed in a glass and granite building on Sussex Drive with a notable view of the Canadian Parliament buildings on Parliament Hill. The acclaimed structure was...

 in Ottawa
Ottawa
Ottawa is the capital of Canada, the second largest city in the Province of Ontario, and the fourth largest city in the country. The city is located on the south bank of the Ottawa River in the eastern portion of Southern Ontario...

, Ontario
Ontario
Ontario is a province of Canada, located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province and second largest in total area. It is home to the nation's most populous city, Toronto, and the nation's capital, Ottawa....

, Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

. The exhibit is set in the Rideau Street Chapel
Rideau Street Chapel
The Rideau Street Chapel was part of the Convent of Our Lady of the Sacred Heart on Rideau Street in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It was demolished in May of 1972, but its interior was salvaged, due to a public appeal to preserve the architectural beauty it displays. This interior is now on permanent...

, which is the salvaged interior of a demolished convent chapel that is now in permanent display at the National Gallery. Forty speakers are set around the Chapel, each one featuring a single voice of the forty-part choir. The result is a highly-enhanced polyphonic effect, as visitors may hear each individual voice through its corresponding speaker, or listen to the voices of the entire choir blending in together with varying intensities, as one moves around the Chapel.

On 10 June 2006, the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

 asked for 1,000 singers to meet, rehearse and perform the piece in the Bridgewater Hall
Bridgewater Hall
The Bridgewater Hall is an international concert venue in Manchester city centre, England. It cost around £42 million to build and currently hosts over 250 performances a year....

, Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...

 for what was almost certainly the largest performance of the piece in history. On that day, over 700 singers attended, most of whom had never sung the piece before. A program following the day's events was broadcast on BBC Four
BBC Four
BBC Four is a British television network operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation and available to digital television viewers on Freeview, IPTV, satellite and cable....

 on December 9, 2006.

The piece featured prominently in the Poliakoff drama, Gideon's Daughter
Gideon's Daughter
Gideon's Daughter is the second of two linked BBC television dramas written and directed by Stephen Poliakoff.Produced independently for the BBC by Talkback Thames and starring Bill Nighy, Miranda Richardson, and Emily Blunt, it aired in the UK on BBC One on 26 February 2006 and in the US on BBC...

.
Spem in alium accompanies the film Touching the Void
Touching the Void (film)
Touching the Void is a 2003 documentary film based on the book of the same name by Joe Simpson about Simpson's and Simon Yates' disastrous and near fatal attempt to climb the 6,344 metre Siula Grande in the Peruvian Andes in 1985.-Outline:...

, and reaches a climax when Yates and Simpson reach the summit of the mountain.

Tallis' Spem in alium has also inspired several modern composers to write 40-part choral works, for example Giles Swayne
Giles Swayne
Giles Oliver Cairnes Swayne is a British composer.- Biography :Swayne is a cousin of Elizabeth Maconchy. He spent much of his childhood in Liverpool, and began composing at a young age...

's The Silent Land (1998), Jaakko Mäntyjärvi
Jaakko Mäntyjärvi
Jaakko Mäntyjärvi is a Finnish composer of classical music, and a professional translator.-Education:Mäntyjärvi studied English and Linguistics at the University of Helsinki, graduating with an FK degree in 1991...

's Tentatio (2006) and Peter McGarr's Love You Big as the Sky (2007). A London-based choral festival, the Tallis Festival
Tallis Festival
The Tallis Festival , hosted by Exmoor Singers of London, forms the Tallis Festival Choir for just one weekend every 12 to 18 months. The Festival always includes Thomas Tallis' Spem in Alium for 40-part choir, but in addition has commissioned new 40-part works by modern composers, as companion...

, inspired by Spem in alium, commissioned both Mäntyjärvi and McGarr to compose in this genre.

External links

  • Complete performance by the Tallis Scholars
    Tallis Scholars
    The Tallis Scholars are a British vocal ensemble normally consisting of two singers per part, with a core group of ten singers.Formed in 1973 by their director Peter Phillips, they specialise in performing a cappella sacred vocal music written during the Renaissance by composers from all over Europe...

    , followed by 10-minute discussion on BBC Radio 3
    BBC Radio 3
    BBC Radio 3 is a national radio station operated by the BBC within the United Kingdom. Its output centres on classical music and opera, but jazz, world music, drama, culture and the arts also feature. The station is the world’s most significant commissioner of new music, and its New Generation...

     (28 October 2007) [requires Real Player or Media Player Classic
    Media Player Classic
    Media Player Classic is a compact media player for 32-bit and 64-bit Microsoft Windows. The application mimics the look and feel of the old, lightweight Windows Media Player 6.4 but integrates most options and features found in modern media players...

    ]
  • Choral Public Domain Library (with further discussion of the work, as well as complete score and singer's editions for each of the eight choirs, available for free legal download).
  • Notes by Peter Phillips for the Tallis Scholars
    Tallis Scholars
    The Tallis Scholars are a British vocal ensemble normally consisting of two singers per part, with a core group of ten singers.Formed in 1973 by their director Peter Phillips, they specialise in performing a cappella sacred vocal music written during the Renaissance by composers from all over Europe...

    recording
  • Notes by Jeremy Summerly for the Oxford Camerata recording
  • The Early Music Show
  • Brighton Consort's MIDI Set offers midi files of each choir and each part within each choir for practice.
  • Straight into the charts... a hit from 1568.
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