Allegri Ensemble: Miserere - Allegri & MacMillan

For our first concert for 2024 in the magnificent surrounds of St David’s Cathedral, we offer music of beauty, hope and penitence, befitting the season of Lent.

Music old and new will be brought into sharp relief: 'Ave Verum Corpus' set by both William Byrd and Karl Jenkins will bookend the program, and we are excited to present two settings of the 'Miserere'; the iconic version by Gregorio Allegri with its famous 'top-Cs', and its powerful modern counterpoint, composed by James MacMillan in 2009.

Palestrina’s works 'Super Flumina Babylonis' and his double-choir 'Stabat Mater' illustrate the sorrows of the Israelites during their Babylonian exile, and of the Virgin Mary at the Crucifixion. The heart-rending grief of King David at the loss of his son Absalom is laid bare in Thomas Tomkins’ 'When David Heard'.