The Renaissance composers in tonight’s concert all worked in the Sistine Chapel and wrote for the choir there, and a number of the works in this programme can be identified as having been written specifically for that building: Allegri’s Miserere was composed for the exclusive use of the Sistine Chapel during the Tenebrae services of Holy Week, Morales was there for much of his life, and Carpentras’ Lamentations are especially interesting as he is said to have gone back there later in life and found the choir to be using faulty copies.

The framework for the programme is a composite mass by Palestrina.