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Spem in Alium


steve-bbb
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[b] [url="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/20/nyregion/moved-to-tears-at-the-cloisters-by-a-ghostly-tapestry-of-music.html"][size=4]Moved to Tears at the Cloisters by a Ghostly Tapestry of Music[/size][/url][/b]


Spem in Alium

[url="http://youtu.be/w2pv8BkpFgY"]http://youtu.be/w2pv8BkpFgY[/url]

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I absolutely love this piece of music.

A couple of years ago I was visiting my wife's parents in Nottingham and we spent the day in Highfields park (the main Notts Uni Campus). In the Djianogly Centre (don't even ask how you are s'posed to pronounce that) they often have art exhibitions and displays.

We went in there on this one occasion and the room had a circle of 25 speakers all facing into the middle.

Apparently Spem in Alium was written for five choirs of five people singing the different parts.

So the 'artist' had individually mic'd up each singer separately and isolated from the others so you could walk round the circle and either hear one person singing on their own by standing right up against a speaker or stand close to one of the groups of 5 to hear their combined sound or just sit on the seat in the centre of the whole circle and I can only describe it as 'soak' in the whole amazing sound.

It sounded simply incredible and without doubt the best sonic experience I have ever err..experienced.

If everyone in the world could hear the beauty of that - this world might be a better place.

*Edit - now I have bothered to watch the bloomin' video it is wot I woz talking about! Doh! :gas:

Edited by Jonnyboy Rotten
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[quote name='Shaggy' timestamp='1380040894' post='2219983']
Sublime.

My "go to" piece of music for the last 30 years, along with (strangely enough) the "Fantasia on a theme by Thomas Tallis" by Vaughan Williams
[/quote]

And that was the music Dad wanted for his funeral. Strangely enough.

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the 40 speaker art installation thingy is a great idea only just recently stumbled across it

i remember this from uni days when was in the 'big choir' and we did this - didnt appreciate it then at the time as much as i do now which is a shame as its not very often that any singer is fortunate enough to be in a choir large enough to do this - i do seem to remember though that this piece (and other similar plainsong style stuff) is actually more difficult to sing than one would at first imagine

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The one that gives me goose bumps is Miserere Mei, by Allegri. The version by The Sixteen gets me every time.
Feast your lugs on this.... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fcWo1hKHu40

I was fortunate enough to see the Tallis Scholars in Tewkesbury Abbey this summer. They were performing a lot of Byrd, Allregri etc along with a couple of modern compositions in the same style, and they were stunning. Such pure voices and no vibrato in sight :)

Edited by ratman
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I've always been puzzled by the conventional music lessons we had at school which pushed German and other European composers at you, they seemed obsessed with Beethoven, Schubert, Brahms, Liszt, Bach etc. I personally can't see how any of them are in any way comparable to any of the music mentioned here. I'd be interested in hearing if any one has any ideas how and why this might be? Is it regarded as inferior to more modern classical music in music circles?

I love this music but I find it quite intense and find it quite difficult to listen to for any length of time (unless live).
I absolutely love the bass, but find it doesn't move me in the way this music does. There is something magical about the voice which
other instruments don't have.

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