# Who exactly was responsible for adding the famous high C to Allegri's Miserere ?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-exactly-was-responsible-for-adding-the-famous-high-c-to-allegris-miserere/787468>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [May 26, 2017, 12:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-exactly-was-responsible-for-adding-the-famous-high-c-to-allegris-miserere/787468 "2017-05-26T12:22:17Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![garusic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a87d85/32.png) [@garusic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/garusic)\
**Post date:** [May 26, 2017, 12:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-exactly-was-responsible-for-adding-the-famous-high-c-to-allegris-miserere/787468/1 "2017-05-26T12:22:17Z")

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I know that he was a castrato, but exactly who ?

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**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\
**Post date:** [May 26, 2017, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-exactly-was-responsible-for-adding-the-famous-high-c-to-allegris-miserere/787468/2 "2017-05-26T12:58:10Z")

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Moved to Cafe Society.

Colibri  
General Questions Moderator

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**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\
**Post date:** [May 26, 2017, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-exactly-was-responsible-for-adding-the-famous-high-c-to-allegris-miserere/787468/3 "2017-05-26T14:19:37Z")

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I am no expert but does this help? From [https://www.york.ac.uk/music/conferences/nema/oreilly/#chapter5](https://www.york.ac.uk/music/conferences/nema/oreilly/#chapter5)

> [@](#):
>
> He [Alfieri] states that the Papal Choir ‘converts G into B diapason’ (“E necessario poi sapere, che nella predetta Cappella il tono G si converte in B del Diapason”). This is the first ‘official’ mention of upward transposition, and accords with part of Mendelssohn’s testimony (from 1831), which quotes the first bar in B minor in his letter to his family of April 4th. Perhaps by the time he wrote to his old teacher Professor Zelter on June 16th, he had decided that, organ pitch at Rome being low, the piece was actually being sung in C minor. He reproduces the end of the first half of verse 3 in this key38 and continues:
> 
> The soprano [the famous castrato Mariano] intones the high C in a pure soft voice, allowing it to vibrate for a time, then slowly glides down …