Embedded somewhere in the Christmas story no doubt is the idea of much being contained in a small space — or Multum in parvo as the restored road signs leading into Rutland have it. The opposite, which I will leave you to chisel into Latin for yourselves, presumably gets less attention in the Bible, yet nicely sets up any discussion of the current interest in writing choral music for 40 voices.
A performance of any 40-part piece is likely to guarantee a big crowd. Like dinosaurs, they attract attention merely on account of their size, though unlike these forebears they need a quite exceptionally large brain to control their bulk. The problem for the composer is obvious: how to make something interesting of such a massive canvas. Most of us can hum a good tune; some more talented can even imagine the possibility of two or three tunes going on at the same time. But to create a 40-part texture which lasts, say, ten minutes, simply stretches the human mind to its very limits.
The vogue for these colossi started in the first half of the 16th century with Alessandro Striggio’s Ecce beatam lucem, followed a few years later by Thomas Tallis’s Spem in alium. Tallis’s piece remains the sine qua non of all subsequent 40-part endeavour and has helped to set a scene today that gives young composers a real chance to establish themselves. The challenge is there: if someone could write a piece to go alongside the Tallis — by which I mean one scored for the same 40 voices, lasting ten minutes and managing to be as daring and dazzling in performance as the Tallis — then that person’s reputation could be made. Yet I have watched as composer after composer has failed the test.
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