The Classical Music Book

45

See also: Messe de Notre Dame 36–37 ■ Missa l’homme armé 42 ■ Missa Pange lingua 43 ■ Canticum Canticorum 46–51 ■

Great Service 52–53 ■ St. Matthew Passion 98–105

RENAISSANCE 1400–1600

and composed the complex five-

voice Mass O quam glorifica for

his doctorate in 1504.

Masters of sacred music

In the early 16th century, John

Taverner emerged as a significant

composer of English sacred music

after his appointment in 1526 as

Master of the Choristers at Thomas

Wolsey’s newly founded Cardinal

College, Oxford (the future Christ

Church). There he composed three

six-voice Masses, Corona spinea,

Gloria tibi Trinitas, and O Michael.

The tenor part from the “In nomine

Domini” section of the Benedictus

of his Gloria tibi Trinitas became

widely used by other composers as

the basis of vocal and instrumental

arrangements. This was the origin

of the English fantasia genre known

as In nomine, which was popular

until the late 17th century.

Taverner moved back home

to Lincolnshire after Wolsey’s

downfall and produced little more

music. John Sheppard was perhaps

more adept at tailoring his output

to the tastes of Roman Catholic and

Protestant monarchs. He was the

choirmaster at Magdalen College,

Oxford, for three years, and then,

from 1552, a Gentleman of the

Chapel Royal under Edward VI

and Mary I. He died on the eve

of Elizabeth’s succession in 1558.

Much of Sheppard’s Latin-texted

church music survives. His

responsory Media vita for six

voices is a Lenten work of

monumental status: the slow

statement of the Nunc dimittis

chant running through the work

adds to its impact.

An extraordinary response

Thomas Tallis was a member of the

Chapel Royal when Striggio visited

and unfurled his multipart scores.

The Italian’s works were in the

polychoral style, with voices

grouped into self-contained choirs

that came together in a grand

sound at crucial points in the score.

Tallis’s response in his motet

Spem in alium was quite different:

it dipped back into the soaring

sound of Taverner’s and Sheppard’s

music to create an unmistakably

English piece. The 40 voices of

Spem in alium seldom gather in the

same groupings, but each follow

their own paths. One voice may

maintain a steady pace on the beat

but will have a counterpart that

achieves something similar in

syncopation, adding a scintillation

to the steady voice. Like a gradual

murmuration of birds, the voices

gather, separate, and finally

assemble to exhilarating effect. ■

Thomas Tallis Little is known of Tallis’s early life,

but by 1532 he was the organist

of Dover Priory, on England’s

south coast. After the priory’s

dissolution three years later, he

worked at the church of St. Mary-

at-Hill in London, Waltham Abbey,

and Canterbury Cathedral, before

becoming a member of the choir

(“Gentleman”) of Henry VIII’s

Chapel Royal, where he later

became the organist.

Queen Elizabeth granted Tallis

and William Byrd a patent to print

music in 1572, and in 1575 they

jointly published Cantiones sacrae,

a collection of Latin motets. Tallis

was also one of the first to

set English words to psalms,

canticles, and anthems.

Centuries later, his setting of

Psalm 2 was used by Vaughan

Williams for his Fantasia on a

Theme of Thomas Tallis (1910).

Tallis died peacefully at

home in 1585. It is thought he

was around 80 years of age.

Other key works

1560–1569 The Lamentations

of Jeremiah

1567 Nine psalm settings for

Archbishop Parker’s Psalter.

The Duke hearing of the

song [Spem in alium] took his

chain of gold from of his neck

and put it about Tallis his

neck and gave it him.

Thomas Wateridge

Letter (1611)

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