rentine's Second Requiem in D minor, for male
voices; and thought it beautiful and devotional, and in no way lacking
in effect through the absence of _soprani_ and _contralti_, which he
had not missed. He was most struck with the _piano_ passage in canon
beginning with the words _Solvet saeclum_. On September 1, 1882, he
heard at the Festival the same composer's Mass in C, and characterized
as "beautiful" the fugue at the end of the _Gloria_, the part in the
Offertory where the chorus enters in support of the soprano solo, and
the conclusion of the _Dona_. It came as a relief to him after Brahms,
who was not understood at a first hearing, and this inability in
general to grasp good music at once is exhibited in his Italian
correspondence. "This last week," he writes from Rome in April, 1833,
"we have heard the celebrated _Miserere_, or rather the two
_Misereres_, for there are two compositions by Allegri and Boii [it
should be Bai, and a third is now added, composed by Father Baini] so
like each other that the performers themselves can scarcely tell the
difference between them. One is performed on the Thursday and the
other on Good Friday. The voices are certainly very surprising; there
is no instrument to support them, but they have the art of continuing
their notes so long and equally that the effect is as if an organ were
playing, or rather an organ of violin strings, for the notes are
clearer, more subtle and piercing, and more impassioned (so to say)
than those of an organ. The music itself is doubtless very fine, as
everyone says, but I found myself unable to understand all parts of
it. Here and there it was extremely fine, but it is impossible to
understand such a composition on once or twice hearing. In its style
it is more like Corelli's music than any other I know (though very
different too). And this is not wonderful, as Corelli was Master of
the Pope's Chapel, and so educated in the school of Allegri,
Palestrina, and the rest. These are the only services we have been to
during the week."[33]

[Footnote 33: Mozley, _Corr._ i. 380. We do not think that Corelli
ever was Papal choirmaster. For some years, however, he led the
orchestra of the Roman Opera, and was a great friend of Cardinal
Ottoboni. How different the _Tenebrae_ music at St. Peter's can be from
that at the Sixtine chapel, is seen by the three _Misereres_ at the
former being by Basili, Guglielmi, and Zingarelli, all composers of
light opera.]

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