IainFenlon

Fantasia on 40

eyond its immediate meaning for readers of Early Music, the significance of the number 40 is both universal and omnipresent. Somewhat negatively, rain fell for 40days during the flood, Lent consists of 40days in the period before Easter, and the unscrupulous Ali Baba was accompanied by no fewer than 40 thieving companions. On the other hand, popular wisdom has it that life begins at 40. But for anyone interested in 16th-century music, any mention of the number immediately brings to mind Thomas Talliss motet Spem in alium, written for eight choirs of five voices. As has long been recognized, Talliss model, in terms of the motets magisterial conception though not in respect of its style, was the polychoral music of Alessandro Striggio, who is known to have travelled to England, and whose madrigal Dogni gratia damor was written to commemorate his audience with Queen Elizabeth I.For a long time Striggio was known to have composed one 40-part motet, Ecce beatam lucem, and it was this that was thought to have in some sense inspired Talliss piece. The evidence comes from an anecdote written by a law student, Thomas Wateridge, in 1611:

In Queen Elizabeths 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 being 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 Tallis beinge very skilfull was sett to try whether he would undertake ye matter, wch he did and made one of 40 partes wch was songe in the gallery at Arundell house wch so farre surpassed ye other that the Duke, hearing yt songe, tooke his chayne of Gold from his necke & putt it about Tallice his necke and gave yt him.

Allowing for Wateridges numerical mistake, the story fits the known historical facts rather neatly. Although the earliest manuscript to contain Spem in alium was written in 1610, when the work was performed at the investiture of Henry, Prince of Wales, its existence is also noted in an inventory of Nonsuch Palace drawn up in 1596 as a song of fortie partes, made by Mr Tallys. Nonsuch was sold by Queen Mary Ito Henry Fitzalan, Earl of Arundel in 1556; Arundel House, which stood between the Strand and the river, was later owned by Thomas Howard, a great collector and patron of thearts. There matters rested until Davitt Moroney discovered Alessandro Striggios lost Mass for 40 and 60 voices, Missa Ecco si beato giorno, not in a dusty cupboard in an English country house, nor in the library of a Florentine aristocratic palace, but in the Bibliothque Nationale in Paris, where the parts had lain mis-catalogued and unnoticed. It was already known that this extraordinary work, unsurpassed in 16th-century in terms of its magnificence and sheer sonic power (unlike Talliss motet it calls for continuo instruments), had travelled to a number of European courts (including Munich, where it was given under the direction of Lassus) with Striggio, on the same trip that also brought him to London. Performed for the first time at the BBC Proms in 2007, it has now been recorded by Robert Hollingworth and IFagiolini together with a dazzling array of supporting groups: Fretwork, The Rose Consort of Viols, The English Cornett and Sackbut Ensemble and The City Musicke. And so the possibility is raised that Tallis was aware of the existence of the Mass, and that either

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Early Music, Vol. xli, No. 1 The Author 2013. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. For commercial re-use, please contact journals.permissions@oup.com doi:10.1093/em/cat005, available online at www.em.oup.com

it or Striggios motet was performed during the composers visit to London (such an eventuality is implied by Wateridges remarks). The story of the recuperation of these 40-part pieces, and of their various historical contexts, nicely illustrates the successful marriage of musicology and performance

that lay at the heart of Early Music as it was conceived by its first editor John Thomson, greatly encouraged and helped by Howard Mayer Brown, who taught at Kings College (London) during Davitt Moroneys time there. These founding ideals are to be celebrated as the journal moves into its 41st year.

Iain Fenlon is Professor of Historical Musicology in the Faculty of Music, Cambridge, and a Fellow of Kings College. His principal area of research is music from 1450 to 1650, particularly in Italy. He was awarded the RMA Dent Medal in 1984, is Honorary Keeper of the Music at the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, and founding editor of Early Music History (1981). iaf1000@cam.ac.uk

Forthcoming May 2013

Dowland 450th Anniversary, introduced by Elizabeth Kenny. Including Peter Hauge on Dowland in Copenhagen, Michael Gale on Dowland as teacher, John Bryan on the consort dances of Dowland and Holborne, Kirsten Gibson on Dowland and the Elizabethan courtier poets, Christopher Hogwood on Dowland keyboard arrangements, Anthony Rooley on the Elizabethan emblem tradition and Roger Savage on the history of recording Dowland. Plus Hopkinson Smith, Jakob Lindberg, Nigel North and Paul O'Dette on playing Dowland.

10Early MusicFebruary 2013