Allegri - Miserere Mei, Deus

Imagine a piece of sacred music so special it was kept a secret for 140 years. A brilliantly ornamented work which the Vatican prevented anyone from hearing outside the Sistine Chapel – severe punishment being threatened for whoever revealed its vocal embellishments. Now imagine a 14-year-old musical genius who, hearing this work only twice, wrote it down from memory.

That young prodigy was Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart; and the music he transcribed so accurately was Allegri’s Miserere mei, Deus – a work that’s little more than plainchant without its transforming vocal additions. Experts agree these were not a feature of Allegri’s original, but they give this music a spiritual potency – and make it a thing of beauty. Especially when sung by a choir as accomplished as The Tallis Scholars.

A blessed miracle

The boy Mozart escaped excommunication because his feat of musical memory impressed the Pope, who summoned the young composer to Rome and praised him. Once Mozart’s version of the work (for there were other versions besides the one we know today) was published in London in 1771, the ban on its performance outside the Catholic Church was lifted. A decision for which we should be grateful, for this incredibly simple, incredibly moving work of late Renaissance polyphony is a treasure that deserves to be admired by all.

To the Host in the highest

Anyone about to listen to this music, even if they’ve heard it before, should prepare themselves. They should leave aside their everyday thoughts, and find a place where they can forget the world exists.

Because time stops still as the words Miserere mei, Deus, secundum magnam misericordiam tuam (Have mercy upon me, O God, according to your great mercy) begin to fill Merton College Chapel in Oxford – the setting for this spacious and atmospheric recording.

A moment later, the first of the chanted sections begins (T1-0:53) – followed by what may sound like a mistake in the sound engineering, as a smaller group of voices answers this chant from some distance away (T-1:13). Don’t adjust your equipment: this is one of the effects which lends to the Miserere an almost ethereal quality. Another effect – and perhaps the best-loved in this work – is achieved by a lone soprano voice soaring high above this small vocal group (T1-1:44~2:04), carrying to heaven the words et a peccato meo munda me (and cleanse me from my sin).

Divinely inspired, simply conceived

This alternation between choirs near and far, the gorgeous vocal decoration that adorns some of the lines, and the haunting high-note solos from a single soprano comprise almost all of this work’s twelve and a half minutes (which feel like many more, so timeless is this music). Only the words change; Allegri choosing Psalm 51 for his text. As the piece nears its close, he asks the two bodies of voices to join in unison (T1-11:39). It make for a serene end to a work you can understand the Catholic Church wanting to keep to itself.