Allegri Miserere - The Sixteen 25th Anniversary Edition

Allegri (Composer), Palestrina (Composer), Harry Christophers (Conductor), The Sixteen (Performer) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Performer: The Sixteen
• Conductor: Harry Christophers
• Composer: Allegri, Palestrina
• Audio CD (June 1, 2003)
• SPARS Code: DDD
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: CORO
• ASIN: B00008ZZ27
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #78,435 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Antonio LOTTI: Crucifixus

2. Giovanni Pierluigi da PALESTRINA: Stabat Mater Dolorosa

3. Gregorio ALLEGRI: Miserere

4. Giovanni Pierluigi da PALESTRINA: Missa Papae Marcelli

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars THRESHOLD OF PARADISE, September 2, 2008

By 

DAVID BRYSON (Glossop Derbyshire England) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Allegri Miserere - The Sixteen 25th Anniversary Edition (Audio CD)

Allegri's Miserere is given the top billing on this disc, perhaps because of some celebrated special effects, explained in the liner notes, that it contains. The first track is devoted to a sombre and beautiful Crucifixus (from the Nicene Creed) by one Lotti, an older contemporary of Bach. Admirable and compelling, both of these, but what I bought this disc for was the two items by Palestrina, his Stabat Mater and the celestial Missa Papae Marcelli.

It is not just the quality of the early music specialists these days but the sheer profusion of them that continues to astonish me. I looked through the list of singers (18, not 16) and while I did not recognise most of the names offhand that may simply be because I did not investigate my large record collection, and I certainly did spot the name of a certain Mark Padmore among the tenors. The top parts are taken by sopranos, not trebles, all the altos are male, and the four soloists in the Allegri are also members of the choir.

To me, the 16th century polyphonists are not some recondite category of music that I have come to know in a spirit of antiquarianism. My early education made me familiar with Palestrina, Victoria and others of the period before I knew Bach Beethoven and Brahms, and that surely has to be the right sequence simply because it is the chronological and historical sequence. I have no mental reconfiguring to do before I listen to Palestrina because I have long known, and indeed sung in, the two works here. If they need `selling' to anyone, the best I can do is to state baldly that these performances are magnificent and the music itself is sublime beyond sublimity. This performance of the Mass in particular even ousts my treasured account from Willcocks in being at least as well sung and benefiting from more modern recording. Everything here is `quality'. To compliment a choir on its infallible intonation is not like congratulating an author on his spelling, it is a higher sort of achievement and one that cannot be taken for granted even nowadays and even from the most distinguished performers. Here it is utterly beyond question, and I was overawed by the breath-control that these vocalists, to a man and a woman, exhibited in the long final notes of the various pieces. All this is at the service of a musical sense that is instinct with belief and commitment as well as being stylistically impeccable. Nothing is exaggerated, but I sense a fervour in this singing that would not be out of place in the most `expressive' later music. The recording is just about ideal too, clear without either dryness or excessive resonance, reproducing with fidelity the superb vocal tone.

Nothing Allegri can do matches the heavenly serenity of the Missa Papae Marcelli, but the performance, as you might expect, is to the same standard, and so is that of Lotti's very fine Crucifixus. Harry Christophers contributes a short preface, and the main liner note, by Ivan Moody, provides some informative background. It may be that a little comment of my own on the texts respectively of the Stabat Mater and the Miserere will be helpful, because these are not the brightest jewels of the production.

The text of the Stabat Mater that Palestrina used is not the one I am most familiar with, the text set by Verdi for one. Details of the divergences need not concern us now, but for the odd fact that in two instances the Sixteen sing the other version and not what you will find printed here. I shall point these out at the places where they occur, in the course of correcting misprints in the Latin

. `Contristantem': read `contristatam'
. `Per tansivit': read `pertransivit'
. `Quis Christi': delete `Quis'
. `Me sentire vim doloris,': the comma should either be removed or come after `fac' in the next line
. `Fac me vere tecum flere': the other version `Fac me tecum pie flere' meaning `Make me weep devoutly with you' is what is sung
. `con dolore': read `condolere'
. `Ob amorem Filii': the other version `Et cruore Filii' meaning `And with the blood of your Son' is what is sung
. `custodire': read `custodiri'

There are a few misprints in the Latin of the Miserere as well, and more seriously there is a fair little sprinkling of mistranslations in the English. I shall mention only the outright errors and not those cases where the translation allows itself some latitude

. `miserationem': read `miserationum'
. `Ecce enim...manifestasti mihi': the translation is completely wrong. Read `For lo, thou hast loved truth: thou hast revealed to me those things in thy wisdom that are uncertain and hidden.'
. `mudabor': read `mundabor'
. `the bones which thou hast broken': read `my bones that were cast down'
. `invisceribus': read `in visceribus'
. `proiecias': read `proicias'
. `free spirit': read `lordly spirit'
. `sanquinibus': read `sanguinibus'
. `dedessem': read `dedissem'
. `build thou the walls of Jerusalem': read `so that the walls of Jerusalem may be built'
. `imponenet': read `imponent'

It is worth understanding what we are listening to, especially when what we are listening to is as transcendentally good as we find it here.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Definitive Version, October 2, 2008

By 

Allan M. Lees (Novato, CA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Allegri Miserere - The Sixteen 25th Anniversary Edition (Audio CD)

A little over two centuries ago a shock-haired composer called Beethoven decided that bigger is better and drove the expansion of the classical orchestra, as well as technical evolution of the iron-framed piano necessary to thunder over the top of a full string section. Vocalists, unable to equip themselves with iron-framed throats, found themselves straining to project to the degree now required. Some, indeed, suffered embolisms and ruptures from the back-pressure that built up in their chests and throats as they attempted to match the orchestra's increase in sheer volume. Fortunately a solution was discovered: the quavering vibrato that releases pressure while permitting greater volume to be achieved. From henceforth, singers would warble.

And of course music adapted. The great 19th century operas and masses all assume this vocal technique and the scores are written accordingly. But music cannot be altered retrospectively, so vocal music written before the time of Beethoven suddenly became mis-matched with contemporary vocal techniques. And so it remained until a movement grew up in England in the 1970s that demanded greater authenticity in music. No more would Mozart be played in a quasi-Brahmsian manner; no more would vocalists warble when they should sustain clear unwavering notes. Christopher Hogwood formed The Academy of Ancient Music to play Vivaldi and Mozart crisply and compellingly, while Harry Christophers formed The Sixteen to perform pre-Beethoven vocal music as it should be sung.

This required everyone, but most especially the female singers, to retrain in order to produce clear unmodulated notes. The results, especially in the Miserere, are astonishingly beautiful and powerful and awe-inspiring. I have had the great good fortune to listen to The Sixteen performing in churches and cathedrals in England, and of course nothing can quite match the power of a live performance. When this type of music is available in DVD5.1 surround-sound format things may get closer, but meanwhile CD is as good as it gets and well worth listening to. The authenticity of sound is incredible - the female singers sound just like young boys: hollow, pure, producing a clarity of tone that is agonizingly beautiful. There is very little music that literally can raise the hair on the back of your neck, but the Miserere as performed by The Sixteen is definitely on the list, along with the Dies Irae of Mozart's Requiem (K626) as performed by Hogwood's Academy.

If you don't think you really like "classical" music (and in fact this is very pre-classical indeed) but you want to experience something sublime, something so far beyond what passes for music nowadays that it is almost a different world, do buy this marvelous recording. It is as close as any of us will ever come to the sounds of angels singing.

And for those who want the text:

Miserere mei, Deus: secundum magnam misericordiam tuam.
Et secundum multitudinem miserationum tuarum, dēlē iniquitatem meam.
Amplius lavā me ab iniquitate mea: et a peccato meo mundā me.
Quoniam iniquitatem meam ego cognōscō: et peccatum meum contra me est semper.
Tibi soli peccāvī, et malum coram te fēcī: ut iustificeris in sermonibus tuis, et vincās cum iudicaris.
Ecce enim in inquitatibus conceptus sum: et in peccatis concepit me mater mea.
Ecce enim veritatem dilexisti: incerta et occulta sapientiae tuae manifestasti mihi.
Asperges me, Domine, hyssopo, et mundābor: lavābis me, et super nivem dēalbābor.
Auditui meo dabis gaudium et laetitiam: et exsultabunt ossa humiliata.
Averte faciem tuam a peccatis meis: et omnes iniquitates meas dele.
Cor mundum crea in me, Deus: et spiritum rectum innova in visceribus meis.
Ne proiicias me a facie tua: et spiritum sanctum tuum ne auferas a me.
Redde mihi laetitiam salutaris tui: et spiritu principali confirma me.
Docebo iniquos vias tuas: et impii ad te convertentur.
Libera me de sanguinibus, Deus, Deus salutis meae: et exsultabit lingua mea iustitiam tuam.
Domine, labia mea aperies: et os meum annuntiabit laudem tuam.
Quoniam si voluisses sacrificium, dedissem utique: holocaustis non delectaberis.
Sacrificium Deo spiritus contribulatus: cor contritum, et humiliatum, Deus, non despicies.
Benigne fac, Domine, in bona voluntate tua Sion: ut aedificentur muri Ierusalem.
Tunc acceptabis sacrificium iustitiae, oblationes, et holocausta: tunc imponent super altare tuum vitulos.

9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Taste of Heaven, September 25, 2007

By 

Gaylan K. Mathiesen - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Allegri Miserere - The Sixteen 25th Anniversary Edition (Audio CD)

I got into my car, turned the ignition, and the radio was already tuned to Minnesota Public Radio. Allegri's Miserere, performed by The Sixteen was playing. I couldn't move until it was over. It was like being transported to a different realm. I paid attention to the announcer's description of the piece afterward, and lost no time in tracking it down on the Internet. The Miserere was only ever sung in the Sistine Chapel, its composer being a chorister there. If you have any taste at all for sacred choral music, you won't be disappointed!