The Vatican’s Sistine Chapel should be the ne plus ultra of choral singing.

The Tallis Scholars: Inspired by the Sistine Chapel
Cadogan Hall, London

The Vatican’s Sistine Chapel should be the ne plus ultra of choral singing. When you look at the musicians who have been part of the papal choir, their names in some cases actually carved into the building’s stones – Josquin, Palestrina, Allegri, Arcadelt – it’s hard to accept just how far the institution has slumped over the centuries. Hopes and ambitions were recently raised under Mgr Massimo Palombella, whose tenure as music director from 2010-2019 banished memories of the “Sistine screamers”, and even launched a new recording relationship with Deutsche Grammophon. But financial irregularities brought that era to an abrupt end.

But if the Italians are in danger of letting their choral traditions die out, English choirs continue to keep the flame bright. Their roots may not stretch as far back as the papal choir’s, but the Tallis Scholars are still elder statesmen of renaissance choral singing, pioneers in a revival that music director Peter Phillips (inset) has helped shepherd from socks-and-sandals fringe to musical mainstream.

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