IвЂ™d used my annual subscriptionвЂ™sВ upgrade pass for a seat right in the center of the premier orchestra section, which IвЂ™d done to enjoy the piano soloist in the nightвЂ™s second piece (coincidentally, a Mozart Piano Concerto). I recently got the chance to hear a performance of AllegriвЂ™s вЂњMiserere,вЂќ in San FranciscoвЂ™s Davies Hall. He went back on Friday night to give it a double-check. All this stuff going on, a cappella, and Mozart got it all. On top of that are four solo voices that create their own quartet voice. There are two chorus parts, divided at times by two, to create four groups of singers. And weвЂ™re talking twelve minutes of choral, contrapuntal music. Late into the night, he wrote it out from memory, note for note. So, as he and his father attended the Wednesday Tenebrae service, he listened to the incredible choral music, and after the performance, his brain set to work. Not prone to doing exactly as heвЂ™d been instructed if he didnвЂ™t see the rationale behind it. The Vatican knew it had a winner on its hands with AllegriвЂ™s Miserere and, wanting to preserve its aura of mystery and exclusivity, forbade replication, threatening anyone who attempted to copy or publish it with excommunication.Д«utВ the teen Mozart was hungry for a challenge, and, well, you know Mozart. Why the big deal? Mystery and inaccessibility have a way of adding cachet to any piece of music, particularly one so strikingly gorgeous, at once austere and lushly inviting. Visitors, musicians, and travelers would arrange their schedules well in advance to be sure and catch a performance. To attend this service and hear this musicВ was a big deal. This twelfth one, a setting of Psalm 51, composed by Gregorio Allegri in the late 1630вЂ™s forВ Pope Urban VIII, had become the mainstay, far and away the most popular Miserere. It was a big tradition since 1514, a total of twelve Misereres had been chanted/sung at this service. In the VaticanвЂ™s Sistine Chapel, to be more exact, as part of the exclusive Tenebrae service on Wednesday and Friday of Holy Week. This was the only time and place you could hear AllegriвЂ™s famous вЂњMiserere mei DeusвЂќ being sung. Their timing was perfect: Rome during Holy Week. He and his father Leopold were in Rome, working their way through Italy for the month as the young Wolfgang performed and studied and learned. The fourteen-year-old Mozart didnвЂ™t see himself as being a music pirate, mind you.В He was just doing the thing he so excelled at, with his musical genius and photographic memory, back in the spring of 1770. But that didnвЂ™t stop the teenaged Mozart. The Vatican knew it had a winner on its hands with AllegriвЂ™s вЂњMiserereвЂќ and, wanting to preserve its aura of mystery and exclusivity, forbade replication, threatening anyone who attempted to copy or publish it with excommunication.

Music prodigy boy hearing test