What inspired Spem in Alium?

As you probably know, as a boy I was fortunate enough to sing in the choir of Portsmouth Cathedral.  [To be precise, this is Portsmouth, Hampshire, England and the Anglican Cathedral, not the Catholic Cathedral.]  I was introduced to a complete variety of choral music, but my most of my lasting favourites were from the Renaissance, in particular the antiphonal settings of motets and other parts of the service in both Latin and English.

Music for antiphonal (two) choirs of instruments and/or singers were common in formal and religious music performances of the 16th century.  Most of these were usually written for up to eight voices, but a few used 10 or 12.  Works with three or more choirs were rare.  However, using the unique acoustics of San Marco in Venice, the Venetian School culminating with the incomparable Giovanni Gabrieli wrote music for multiple choirs of voices and instruments sometimes for 12 to 15 voices.  However, although it has been used occasionally during subsequent centuries, polychoral is now an unusual form of music.  More common today is a much larger ensemble (e.g., an orchestra) with different sections (brass, wind, strings) playing the role of separate choirs.  Note that there is no generally available technology to record and play back music presented by multiple groups separated physically both horizontally and vertically (as needed for some Venetian originals).

One of the greatest music masterpieces of the 16th century is the motet "Spem in Alium" by Thomas Tallis (c.1505-1585).  It is a setting of the words "Spem in alium numquam habui/Praeter in te Deus Israel", "I have never put my hope in any other but in Thee, God of Israel."  It uses eight choirs of five voices (thus 40 in total), which is a huge number, especially for those days.  It is beautifully crafted, with the voices and choruses speaking in sequences and together.

So where did Tallis get the inspiration to try this?  The details are not precisely known (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spem_in_alium), but the musical inspiration is likely to have been "either the 40-part motet Ecce beatam lucem or the 40-60-voice mass Missa sopra Ecco sì beato giorno, both by Alessandro Striggio, who is known to have visited London in June 1567 after a trip through Europe."

So who was Striggio?  Although, I may have heard his name in this context before, I knew nothing about him, and, although some of his surviving works may have been performed, I had never heard any of them.

Alessandro Striggio (1536/7-1592) was an extremely successful Italian musician (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alessandro_Striggio) who worked extensively for the Medici family.  He wrote in many different styles and forms.  "The madrigal comedy, either invented by Striggio or made famous by him, was long considered to be a forerunner of opera."

Apparently, Ecce beatem lucem had survived, but I had never heard it, or heard of it.  The longer Mass was considered lost, but it was re-discovered mislabeled as a mass for 4 voices by "Strusco" in the Bibliothèque nationale in Paris in 2005.  It has been performed, mainly in the UK, several times since then.  However, when I went looking for a recording of Spem in Alium for my music collection, I ran into all this information.  I was able to find a CD with a performance by a group assembled as "I Fagiolini" under the direction of Robert Hollingworth.

What's more, the CD also includes a rendering of Spem.  The recordings are breathtaking, if that is your taste in music.  The voices produce pure and ethereal sounds, not the strained agonized sounds made for emotional effect by rock, country/folk, jazz, and yes opera singers in more recent years.

The harmony used by Striggio is perforce fairly simple and conservative: this was written in the 1560s after all, and only in the previous few decades had polyphony emerged.  The mass is set for five choirs of eight voices.  In the Benedictus, of the mass only one choir is used.  However, in the final Agnus Dei, each choir is expanded to twelve voices for a total of 60!  This was unique, at least for the 16th century, and for a long time thereafter.

Incidentally, in the process of finding the Striggio mass, I also found another performance of Tallis: "Janet Cardiff's Forty-Part Motet (2001), a sound installation which is part of the permanent collection of the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa.  [...]  Forty speakers are set around the Chapel, each one featuring a single voice of the 40-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."  One day, I must make a pilgrimage there.

So Tallis was inspired by compositions of Striggio, but this begs the question: what inspired Striggio to venture into this completely uncharted realm?

Gareth Hunt, (updated) 16 April 2020