The Tallis Scholars go surround

Wednesday, March 2, 2022

A classic album is remastered with Dolby Atmos for Spatial Audio

Gimell, the multi-Gramophone Award-winning label of The Tallis Scholars and its Director, Peter Phillips, has remastered one of its classic recordings for Spatial Audio. The 2007 recording of Allegri's Miserere and Palestrina's Missa Papae Marcelli is now available on Apple Music in the new Dolby Atmos mix.

Steve Smith, who produced the recording 15 years ago in Oxford, commented that ‘having not worked before with Dolby Atmos and Spatial Audio, I was delighted when Jonathan Allen, who is very experienced in Spatial mixing, agreed to help me prepare a Dolby Atmos mix of our 2007 recording of Allegri’s Miserere and Palestrina's Missa Papae Marcelli.

'Luckily, the spatial placement of the microphones used to capture the gorgeous acoustics of Merton College Chapel for our original Surround Sound recording provided Jonathan with the essential elements for a convincing Spatial Audio mix. After preparing an initial mix listening to professional studio loudspeakers in a 7.1 configuration, we refined the sound when listening to domestic systems including a Sennheiser Ambeo soundbar, an Echo Studio smart speaker and standard headphones.

'For me, the greatest revelation when listening in Jonathan's studio was the difference between Stereo and Dolby Atmos on standard headphones. Now that the new mix is available on Apple Music, I can hear the same subtle but pleasing difference simply by listening with headphones connected to an iPad. The Atmos version has a wider soundstage and the audio is more engaging,’ he added.

The recording, in its new guise on Apple Music, also carries scrolling ‘lyrics’ so you can follow the texts with parallel translation in English.

To set up an iPhone or iPad to listen to Dolby Atmos recordings on standard headphones or earbuds go to Settings  > Music >  Dolby Atmos and select 'Always On'. To compare the Atmos and Stereo versions simply toggle between 'Always On' and 'Off'. Dolby Atmos is not available on earlier Apple devices. 

If you are not yet a subscriber to Apple Music, it is free for the first month, boasts a catalogue of more than 75 million songs and offers lossless streaming, as well as albums in Spatial Audio. 

 

 

Gramophone Print

  • Print Edition

From £6.67 / month

Subscribe

Gramophone Digital Club

  • Digital Edition
  • Digital Archive
  • Reviews Database
  • Full website access

From £8.75 / month

Subscribe

                              

If you are a library, university or other organisation that would be interested in an institutional subscription to Gramophone please click here for further information.