Thomas Tallis

Thomas Tallis
Detail of an 18th-century posthumous engraving by Gerard Vandergucht, after Niccolò Haym
Born	c. 1505 Probably Kent, England
Died	23 November 1585 (aged 79–80) Greenwich, England
Works	List of compositions
Signature

Thomas Tallis (/ˈtælɪs/; also Tallys or Talles; c. 1505 – 23 November 1585) was an English composer of High Renaissance music. His compositions are primarily vocal, and he occupies a primary place in anthologies of English choral music. Tallis is considered one of England's greatest composers, and is honoured for his original voice in English musicianship.

Life

Youth

As no records about the birth, family or childhood of Thomas Tallis exist, almost nothing is known about his early life or origins. Historians have calculated that he was born in the early part of the 16th century, towards the end of the reign of Henry VII of England, and estimates for the year of his birth range from 1500 to 1520. His only known relative was a cousin called John Sayer. As the surnames Sayer and Tallis both have strong connections with Kent, Thomas Tallis is usually thought to have been born somewhere in the county.

There are some suggestions that Tallis sang as a child of the chapel in the Chapel Royal, the same singing establishment which he joined as an adult. He was probably a chorister at the Benedictine Priory of St. Mary the Virgin and St. Martin of the New Work, in Dover, where he was employed at an early age, but it is impossible to know whether he was educated there. He may have sung at Canterbury Cathedral.

Career

Tallis served at court as a composer, teacher and performer for Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary I, and Elizabeth I. He was first designated as an organist at the chapel after 1570, although he would have been employed as an organist throughout his career.

He avoided the religious controversies that raged around him throughout his service to successive monarchs, though he remained, in the words of the historian Peter Ackroyd, an "unreformed Roman Catholic". Tallis was capable of switching the style of his compositions to suit each monarch's different demands. He stood out among other important composers of the time, including Christopher Tye and Robert White. The author and composer Ernest Walker wrote that "he had more versatility of style" than Tye and White, and "his general handling of his material was more consistently easy and certain". Tallis taught the composers: William Byrd, as later associated with Lincoln Cathedral, Elway Bevin, an organist of Bristol Cathedral and Gentleman of the Chapel Royal , and amateur-favourite of Queen Elizabeth, Sir Ferdinando Heybourne.

1530s and 1540s

No record of Tallis exists before 1531, when he is named in the accounts of the Kent Benedictine house Dover Priory. He was employed there as the organist, responsible for directing chants from the organ A "Thomas Tales" is named as the "joculator organorum" at the priory and received an annual payment of £2. The priory was dissolved in 1535, but there is no surviving record of Tallis's departure.

Tallis's whereabouts are not known for the several months after this until mention is made of his being employed at St Mary-at-Hill in London's Billingsgate ward. Records show he was paid four half-yearly payments from 1536 to 1538, with the last payment being specified for services—as either a singer or an organist—for the year up to 25 March 1538.

Around 1538, Tallis was appointed to serve at Waltham Abbey in Essex

Towards the end of 1538 Tallis moved to a large Augustinian monastery, Waltham Abbey in Essex, after he had come into contact with the abbot, whose London home was near to St Mary-at-Hill. At Waltham, Tallis became a senior member. When the abbey, too, was dissolved in March 1540, Tallis left without receiving a pension (since he had only recently been employed there), and was instead given a one-off payment of 40 shillings. He took away a volume of musical treatises copied by John Wylde, once a preceptor at Waltham. Among its contents was a treatise by Leonel Power that prohibited consecutive unisons, fifths, and octaves; the last page is inscribed with his name.

By the summer of 1540 Tallis had moved to the formerly monastic but recently secularised Canterbury Cathedral, where his name heads the list of singers in the newly expanded choir of 10 boys and 12 men. He remained there for two years.

Employment at the Chapel Royal

Tallis's employment in the Chapel Royal probably began in 1543. His name appears on a 1544 lay subsidy roll and is listed in a later document. It is possible that he was connected with the court when at St Mary-at-Hill, since in 1577 Tallis claimed to have "served yo[u]r Ma[jes]tie and yo[u]r Royall ancestors these fortie yeres". He may have been responsible for teaching the boys of the choir keyboard and composition.

Around 1552, Tallis married, probably for the first time, to Joan the widow of a gentleman of the Chapel Royal. Like many other members of the royal household choir, Tallis and his wife lived in Greenwich, although it is not known if he ever owned his house there. He probably rented a house, by tradition in Stockwell Street. According to Tallis' epitaph and Joan Tallis' will, there seems to have been no children of the marriage..

In the 1550s, and 1560s, it is likely that William Byrd was taught the organ and some composition by Thomas Tallis ('bred up to Musick under Tho. Tallys'). Tallis supervised early works such as Sermone Blando and Byrd's contribution to In Exitu Israel, which also has verses composed by John Sheppard and Robert Parsons. It is unknown as to whether Tallis guided Byrd in composing his Lamentations, or if Byrd was under the guidance of his later teacher, Robert Parsons, at Lincoln. Byrd kept a much closer relationship to Tallis, who went on to become the godfather of Byrd's second son, also named Thomas .

Queen Mary I, who commissioned a mass and several settings for Divine Office from Tallis, granted him a lease on a manor in Kent which provided a comfortable annual income. He was present at her funeral on 13 December 1558 and at the coronation of Elizabeth I the following month.

Tallis's pupil William Byrd

Tallis was an eminent figure in Elizabeth's household chapel, but as he aged he became gradually less prominent. In 1575, Elizabeth granted Tallis and Byrd a 21-year monopoly for polyphonic music and a patent to print and publish "set songe or songes in parts", one of the first arrangements of its kind in England. Tallis composed in English, Latin, French, Italian, and other languages. He had exclusive rights to print any music in any language, and he and Byrd had sole use of the paper used in printing music. The only publication made under the monopoly while Tallis was still alive was the 1575 Cantiones quae ab argumento sacrae vocantur : prefaced by Sir Ferdinando Heybourne who wrote that Tallis and Byrd planned to sit their places in Europe alongside 'Lassus, Gombert and Ferrabosco'. It did not sell well and they were forced to appeal to Elizabeth for support. People were wary of the new publications, the sale of which was not helped by both men being Roman Catholics. As Catholics, Byrd and Tallis were forbidden to sell imported music, and were refused any rights to music fonts, or printing patents not under their command. They lacked their own printing press. A second petition in 1577 resulted in the grant of a joint lease of crown lands to the two composers. After the 1575 publication, Tallis is thought to have ceased active composition, as no works from these final years survive. The dark nature of the texts for Tallis' final surviving works, In Jejunio and Derelinquat Impius suggest that Tallis became increasingly-involved with the recusant communities facing persecution, as did Byrd; the Paget Household, known for its devout Catholicism, was a musical centre where ‘songes of Mr Byrdes and Mr Tallys’ were sung.

Final years

Late in his life, Tallis lived in Greenwich, possibly close to the royal Palace of Placentia; tradition holds that he lived on Stockwell Street. He was recorded as a member of Elizabeth I's household in June 1585, and wrote his will in August that year. He died in his house in Greenwich on 20 or 23 November; the different dates are from a register and the Chapel Royal. In his will he left £3.6s.8d. to 'my company the gentlemen of Her Majesty's Chapel towards their feast.' Anthony Roper was to have his gilt bowl, William Byrd his large gilt cup, and Thomas Byrd was to receive Tallis' share of the monopoly although it was his father, William Byrd, who would utilise it.

He was buried in the chancel of St Alfege Church, Greenwich. A brass memorial plate placed there after the death of his wife (but before the death of Elizabeth (ONDB)) is now lost. His remains may have been discarded by labourers during the 1710s, when the church was rebuilt.

His epitaph on a brass plaque, lost in the subsequent rebuilding of the church, was recorded by the English clergyman John Strype in his 1720 edition of John Stow's Survey of London It was most likely written by Henry Stanford: a recusant tutor to the Paget Household, offering a glimpse into Thomas Tallis' personal religious orientation not otherwise stated in his will.

Entered here doth ly a worthy wyght,
Who for long tyme in musick bore the bell:
His name to shew, was THOMAS TALLYS hyght,
In honest virtuous lyff he dyd excell.

He serv'd long tyme in chappel with grete prayse
Fower sovereygnes reygnes (a thing not often seen);
I meane Kyng Henry and Prynce Edward's dayes,
Quene Mary, and Elizabeth oure Quene.

He mary'd was, though children he had none,
And lyv'd in love full thre and thirty yeres
Wyth loyal spowse, whose name yclypt was JONE,
Who here entomb'd him company now beares.

As he dyd lyve, so also did he dy,
In myld and quyet sort (O happy man!)
To God ful oft for mercy did he cry,
Wherefore he lyves, let deth do what he can.

On learning of Tallis's death, William Byrd wrote Ye Sacred Muses, his musical elegy to his colleague and mentor. Tallis's widow Joan, whose Protestant will is dated 12 June 1587, survived him by nearly four years. Richard Cranwell of the Chapel took care of Tallis's widow.

Works

Further information: List of compositions by Thomas Tallis

Early works and Gaude Gloriosa

The earliest surviving works by Tallis are Ave Dei patris filia, Magnificat for four voices, and two devotional antiphons to the Virgin Mary, Salve intemerata virgo (the oldest manuscript of which dates to the 1520s) and Ave rosa sine spinis, which were sung in the evening after the last service of the day; they were cultivated in England at least until the early 1540s. Tallis' early works also suggest the influence of John Taverner and Robert Fayrfax. Taverner in particular is quoted in Salve intemerata virgo, and his later work, Dum transisset sabbatum.

Gaude Gloriosa Dei Mater was previously thought to have been composed in honour of Queen Mary I as a revivalist votive antiphon (in a similar vein to William Mundy's Vox Patris Caelestis, written nostalgically in the outdated, Early English Renaissance style of the Eton Choirbook) due to the work having a more competent use of imitative counterpoint and melodic construction. However, Gaude Gloriosa's dating was revised after renovations at Corpus Christi College, Oxford in 1978 revealed earlier fragments of Gaude Gloriosa, that use an English text translated by Queen Katherine Parr. This means the antiphon was likely composed in the 1540s, or even earlier, referencing the 'Gaude' Window in the west transept of Canterbury Cathedral, which was Tallis' previous workplace before his appointment to the Chapel Royal. It was only after becoming a Gentleman of the Chapel Royal that Tallis received his commission for Gaude Gloriosa's English contrafactum, Se Lord and Behold: intended for use in Henry VIII's French campaign and the capture of Boulogne in 1544.

At Canterbury Cathedral, Thomas Tallis was likely caught between Archbishop Thomas Cranmer's push for reform and resistance from the more conservative members of the cathedral's chapter, Kentish clergymen, and the conservative faction of the Privy Council. Cranmer recommended a syllabic style of music where each syllable is sung to one pitch, as his instructions make clear for the setting of the 1544 English Litany. As a result, the writing of Tallis became less florid. Tallis' Mass for Four Voices, while in Latin, is marked with a syllabic and chordal style emphasising chords, and a diminished use of melisma. Tallis provided a rhythmic variety and differentiation of moods depending on the meaning of his texts.

Music under Edward VI and Mary I

The reformed Anglican liturgy was solidly inaugurated during the short reign of Edward VI (1547–53), and Tallis began to write longer anthems set to English words, as well as services for the Book of Common Prayer. Latin continued to be used alongside the vernacular. Queen Mary set about undoing some of the religious reforms of the preceding decades, following her accession in 1553. She restored the Sarum Rite, and compositional style reverted to the elaborate writing prevalent early in the century. The marriage between Mary and Prince Philip of Spain allowed for a new artistic exchange as his own chapel choir accompanied him to England in 1554; Tallis was likely exposed to visiting continental composers: as evident in Suscipe Quaeso Domine, a non-liturgical motet to celebrate the end of the English schism, which was written in a low-pitched, Flemish style to suit the singing-tradition of Philip's choir. Loquebantur Variis Linguis and Miserere Nostri have the same 7-voice-scoring, meaning that they were also composed with Philip's singers in mind. Missa Puer Natus Est Nobis, likely composed in December 1554 for the both chapel choirs, is more conservative in that it is composed around a festive Cantus Firmus "Puer Natus Est Nobis" that alludes to the birth of a boy for England: Queen Mary believed she was pregnant from 1554-1555, and that the Catholic succession was to be secured, hence the large, celebratory scale of Missa Puer Natus. The mass has characteristics of the English and Flemish traditions, demonstrating Tallis' innovation and influence in the Chapel Royal at the time.

Some of Tallis's works were compiled by Thomas Mulliner in a manuscript copybook called The Mulliner Book before Queen Elizabeth's reign, and may have been used by the queen herself when she was younger. Elizabeth succeeded her half-sister in 1558, and the Act of Uniformity abolished the Roman Liturgy and firmly established the Book of Common Prayer. Composers resumed writing English anthems, although the practice continued of setting Latin texts among composers employed by Elizabeth's Chapel Royal.

Matthew Parker's Psalter and Early Elizabethan Works

The religious authorities at the beginning of Elizabeth's reign, being Protestant, tended to discourage polyphony in church unless the words were clearly audible or, as the 1559 Injunctions stated, "playnelye understanded, as if it were read without singing". Tallis wrote nine psalm chant tunes for four voices for Archbishop Matthew Parker's Psalter published in 1567. One of the nine tunes was the "Third Mode Melody" which inspired the composition of Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis by Ralph Vaughan Williams in 1910. Another of the tunes, a setting of Psalm 67, became known as "Tallis's Canon". A version of it published by Thomas Ravenscroft was used as the tune for Thomas Ken's hymn "All praise to thee, my God, this night", and it has become his best-known composition. The Injunctions, however, also allowed a more elaborate piece of music to be sung in church at certain times of the day, and many of Tallis's more complex Elizabethan anthems may have been sung in this context, or alternatively by the many families that sang sacred polyphony at home. Tallis's better-known works from the Elizabethan years include his settings of the Lamentations (of Jeremiah the Prophet) for the Holy Week, the English anthem If Ye Love Me, and the unique motet Spem in Alium, written for eight five-voice choirs, was likely commissioned by the Earl of Arundel upon hearing a secret performance of Alessandro Striggio's Missa Sopra Ecco Si Beato Giorno. Spem in Alium has a disparate text from the apocryphal Book of Judith that concerns the slaying of Holofernes (possibly added by the Catholic-leaning Howards in reference to the religious motivation of the Ridolfi Plot). Spem in Alium has unique numerology- 40 voices for 40 days of Christ in the Desert, and the motet's length of 60 'longs' adds up to T-A-L-L-I-S in Latin letters, meaning that Tallis must have had a degree of pride in the composition.

Late Elizabethan Works

Toward the end of his life, Tallis continued to innovate in surprising ways. Two large-scale keyboard works, Felix Namque I and Felix Namque II, can be found in the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book (FVB 109 & FVB 110); while these contributions are idiomatic of Tallis' other keyboard pieces in the Mulliner Book in that they are based on a Cantus Firmus, their virtuosic manner is unparalleled by any other works from the European Keyboard culture of the time. Tallis' secular output increased towards the end of his compositional career, as he produced two In Nomines, a Fantasia, a Solfing Song (Ut-Re-Mi-Fa-Sol), One keyboard Lesson in Two Parts (also attrib. Dr John Bull) and madrigals such as Youth is as a Fond Bubble.

In the Baldwin Partbooks, two ambitious psalm settings survive from Tallis: Domine Quis Habitabit and Laudate Dominum Omnes Gentes. Domine Quis Habitabit is the longer of the two, and is written in the same Flemish style as Suscipe Quaeso and Loquebantur Variis Linguis. Laudate Dominum, while shorter, is written in a more sprung, lively style; Laudate Dominum made an impression on the young William Byrd, who used the motet as a model for his own Laudate Pueri. Tallis was well-willing to draw upon his experience in adopting Flemish and Italian influences, while also retaining English character in his music through the use of English cadences.

Tallis was most experimental in his final known compositions in the 1575 Cantiones Sacrae: In Jejunio is written in a rhetorical style, purposely and unusually printed at a low pitch, to reflect the sorrowful nature of the Lenten text. Derelinquat Impius is simply bizarre in that it defies any initial tonal centre with frequent peregrinations and the use of seventh and ninth intervals at "misericors est" likely to mimic pleas for mercy.

Legacy

Tallis is remembered as primarily a composer of sacred vocal music, in part because of his small output of instrumental and secular music that can be successfully attributed to him. In his own lifetime, Tallis was never called a Father of Music (unlike Byrd)- that epithet has its origins in Tallis' Victorian revival. Tallis received a large amount of reverence in his lifetime, with John Baldwin (compiler of the Baldwin Partbooks), naming him as one of the greatest composers of the period, although giving much more deference to Mundy as one of the "Queen's Pallis" . Although Tallis did progress with the continuing changes in English music, his music became outdated by the Virginalist period and the direct influence of Tallis' music waned; Thomas Morley, in his 1597 Plaine and Easie Introduction to Practicall Musicke, names "Fairfax, Taverner, Sheppard, Mundy, White, Parsons, W. Byrde" as equals to Lassus, and among the greatest composers of their day. Tallis has quite obviously been omitted .

Most of Tallis' music that remained in continuous use following his death was his music in the English language, mostly notably his Dorian Service, two sets of responses, two double-chants and various other English-text hymns and anthems for the Book of Common Prayer. It was only in the Victorian period, when interest in early music began to increase, that Spem in Alium was rediscovered and began to be experimented with immediately. Ralph Vaughan Williams and Herbert Howells began composing their own music based off Tallis' themes in the early 20th century, and early music groups, such as the Clerkes of Oxenford and the Tallis Scholars, contributed to further interest in Tallis' Latin motets. Chapelle du Roi recorded the complete works of Tallis in 2005, to celebrate 500 years since the estimated birth of Thomas Tallis. Alamire also recorded Se Lord and Behold for their 2017 album Queen Katherine Parr and Songs of Reformation under the label Obsidian.

No contemporaneous portrait of Tallis survives; the one painted by Gerard Vandergucht dates from 150 years after the composer's death, and there is no reason to suppose that it is a fair likeness. In a rare existing copy of his blackletter signature, he spelled his name "Tallys". Records are incomplete on his works from previous periods; 11 of his 18 Latin-texted pieces from Elizabeth's reign were published, "which ensured their survival in a way not available to the earlier material".

In 1971, the Thomas Tallis School in Kidbrooke opened, a mixed comprehensive school named after the composer.

A fictionalised version of Thomas Tallis was portrayed by Joe Van Moyland in the 2007 Showtime television series The Tudors.

References

Sources

• Ackroyd, Peter (2004). Albion: The Origins of the English Imagination. London: Chatto & Windus. ISBN 978-1-85619-721-2.
• Cole, Suzanne (2008a). "Who is the Father? Changing Perceptions of Tallis and Byrd in Late Nineteenth-Century England". Music and Letters. 89 (2): 212–226. doi:10.1093/ml/gcm082. ISSN 0027-4224. JSTOR 30162967. S2CID 162209818.
• Cole, Suzanne (2008b). Thomas Tallis and His Music in Victorian England. Woodbridge: Boydell Press. ISBN 978-1-84383-380-2.
• Doe, Paul; Allinson, David (2009). "Tallis [Tallys, Talles], Thomas". Grove Music Online (8th ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.27423. ISBN 978-1-56159-263-0.
• Downes, Kerry (1987). Hawksmoor. World of Art. London: Thames and Hudson. OCLC 472150026.
• Farrell, Joseph (2001). Latin Language and Latin Culture: From Ancient to Modern Times. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-77663-9.
• Gatens (2005). "Tallis: Works, all". American Record Guide. Vol. 86, no. 3 May–June. Cincinnati, Ohio. ISSN 0003-0716.
• Harley, John (2015). Thomas Tallis. Farnham, UK: Routledge. ISBN 978-1-317-01036-4.
• Harley, John (2010). The world of William Byrd: musicians, merchants and magnates. Burlington, VT: Ashgate. ISBN 978-1-4094-0088-2. OCLC 531718962.
• Holman, Peter (1999). Dowland: Lachrimae (1604). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-58829-4.
• Lord, Suzanne (2003). Music from the Age of Shakespeare: A Cultural History. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood. ISBN 978-0-313-31713-2.
• Manderson, Desmond (2000). Songs without Music: Aesthetic Dimensions of Law and Justice. University of California Press. ISBN 978-0-520-92221-1.
• Milsom, John (2003). "Sacred Songs in the Chamber". In John Morehen (ed.). English Choral Practice, 1400-1650. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-54408-5.
• Milsom, John (2008). "Tallis, Thomas (c.1505–1585)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/26954. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
• Phillips, Peter (2005). "Sign of Contradiction: Tallis at 500". The Musical Times. 146 (1891): 7–15. doi:10.2307/30044086. ISSN 0027-4666. JSTOR 30044086.
• Shrock, Dennis (2009). Choral Repertoire. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-971662-3.
• Steinberg, Michael (2008). Choral Masterworks: A Listener's Guide. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-534066-2.
• Rimbault, Edward F. (1872). The Old Cheque-book: Or Book of Remembrance, of the Chapel Royal, from 1561-1744. Camden Society.
• "Porter, Dame Shirley, (Lady Porter), (born 29 Nov. 1930), Councillor, Hyde Park Ward, 1974–93, Leader, 1983–91, Westminster City Council; Lord Mayor of Westminster, 1991–92". Who's Who. Oxford University Press. 1 December 2007. Retrieved 7 April 2025.
• Thomas, Jane Resh (1998). Behind the Mask: The Life of Queen Elizabeth I. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. ISBN 978-0-395-69120-5.
• Walker, Ernest (1907). A History of Music in England. Oxford: Clarendon Press. OCLC 869715.
• {{cite book |last=Willis |first=Jonathan |year=2016 |title=Church Music and Protestantism in Post-Reformation England: Discourses, Sites and Identities |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-317-16624-5 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nmE3DAAAQBAJ
• McCarthy, Kerry (2020). Tallis. Oxford Academic.
• McCarthy, Kerry (2019). Early Music, Volume 47, Issue 1, February 2019. Oxford Academic.
• Cole, Suzanne (2008). Thomas Tallis and his Music in Victorian England. Vol. 4. Boydell & Brewer. doi:10.7722/j.ctt81mgs. ISBN 978-1-84383-380-2.
• Flood, W. H. Grattan (1 October 1924). "New Light on Late Tudor Composers: III. William Mundy". The Musical Times. 65 (980): 894. doi:10.2307/911748.
• Domingos, Nathalia. Tradução comentada da primeira parte do tratado A plaine and easie introduction to practicall musicke (1597) de Thomas Morley (Thesis). Universidade de Sao Paulo, Agencia USP de Gestao da Informacao Academica (AGUIA).

Further reading

• Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Tallis, Thomas" . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 26 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.
• Collins, H. B. (1929). "Thomas Tallis". Music & Letters. 10 (2): 152–166. doi:10.1093/ml/X.2.152. ISSN 0027-4224. JSTOR 726038.
• Davey, Henry (1898). "Tallis, Thomas" . In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 55. London: Smith, Elder & Co.
• Milsom, John (1983). English Polyphonic Style in Transition: a study of the sacred music of Thomas Tallis (Thesis). University of Oxford. OCLC 29743412.
• Pike, Lionel (1984). "Tallis: Vaughan Williams: Howells: Reflections on Mode Three". Tempo (149): 2–13. doi:10.1017/S0040298200058496. JSTOR 945078. S2CID 143715625.

External links

• Recordings of church music by Tallis in Latin and English from Umeå Akademiska Kör
• The Mutopia Project has compositions by Thomas Tallis
• List of compositions by Thomas Tallis at the Digital Image Archive of Medieval Music (registration required to view the digitised images)
• Free scores by Thomas Tallis in the Choral Public Domain Library (ChoralWiki)
• Free scores by Thomas Tallis at the International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP)
• Image of Tallis's signature in a book from one of his early places of employment, Waltham Abbey.
• Works by Tallis listed at the EECM Primary Source Database