The Tallis Scholars

The Tallis Scholars

The Tallis Scholars has become one of the leading a cappella choral groups in the world, specializing in Renaissance sacred music.

The group was founded in 1973 by choral conductor Peter Phillips (who, coincidentally, bears the name of a noted English Renaissance composer (1560-1628). The aim was to create an ensemble that, through purity of intonation and impeccable balance of the often complex polyphonic texture of Renaissance music. The group takes its name from Thomas Tallis (c. 1505-1585), a leading English composer of the Renaissance era, famous in particular for one of the most complex of all a cappella compositions, "Spam in Alum," which is written for eight five-part choirs.

The Tallis Scholars quickly came to be popular on the busy English early music scene. In 1981 Phillips and Steve C Smith co-founded a record label, Gimlet Records, specifically to record the Tallis Scholars. The label is now one of the Philips labels, a part of the Polygram Group.

Becoming famous for their beautiful, blended sound, in which all the strands of the polyphony can be followed, they have toured extensively. The group undertakes at least two tours a year in the United States, and tours extensively in the Far East every eighteen months. They appear in Europe every month of the year when they are not on such farther tours. The Tallis Scholars was invited to sing at the Sistine Chapel at ceremonies honoring the new restoration of Michelangelo¹s "Last Judgment." In February, 1994 they performed at the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome to mark the 400th anniversary of the death of Palestrina, who had been a choirboy and, later, music director in that church.

The group has made over thirty-five recordings for Gimmel. They have recorded not only music of Tallis, Byrd and Palestrina, but lesser-known Renaissance composers such as Cipriano de Rore, Heinrich Isaac, Clemens non Papa, and Frei Manuel Cardoso.

In 1987 the Tallis Scholar¹s disc of two parody masses by Josquin received the Gramophone Magazine Record of the Year Award, the first time an early music recording had been so honored. The group has also won two Diapason d¹Or de l¹Année awards. Joseph Stevenson