ALLEGRI, Antonio, called Corregio, from the place of his birth, an eminent historical painter, was born in the year 1494. Being descended of poor parents, and educated in an obscure village, he enjoyed none of those advantages which contributed to form the other great painters of that illustrious age. He saw none of the statues of ancient Greece or Rome, nor any of the works of the established schools of Rome and Venice. But Nature was his guide; and Corregio was one of her favourite pupils. To express the facility with which he painted, he used to say that he always had his thoughts ready at the end of his pencil.

The agreeable smile, and the profusion of graces, which he gave to his madonas, saints, and children, have been taxed with being sometimes unnatural; but still they are amiable and seducing. An easy and flowing pencil, a union and harmony of colours, and a perfect intelligence of light and shade, give an astonishing relief to all his pictures, and have been the admiration both of his contemporaries and his successors. Annibal Caracci, who flourished 50 years after him, studied and adopted his manner in preference to that of any other master. In a letter to his cousin Louis, he expressed with great warmth the impression which was made on him by the first sight of Corregio’s paintings: “Every thing which I see here,” says he, “astonishes me; particularly the colouring and the beauty of the children. They live, they breathe, they smile with so much grace and so much reality, that it is impossible to refrain from smiling and partaking of their enjoyment. My heart is ready to break with grief when I think on the unhappy fate of poor Corregio—that so wonderful a man (if he ought not rather to be called an angeD should finish his days so miserably, in a country where his talents were never known !”.

From want of curiosity or of resolution, or from want of patronage, Corregio never visited Rome, but remained his whole life at Parma, where the art of painting was little esteemed, and of consequence poorly rewarded. This occurrence of unfavourable circumstances occasioned at last his premature death at the age of 40. He was employed to paint the cupola of the cathedral at Parma, the subject of which is the Assumption of the Virgin; and having executed it in a manner that has long been the admiration of every person of good taste, for the grandeur of design, and especially for the boldness of the fore-shortenings (an art which he first and at once brought to the utmost perfection), he went to receive his payment. The canons of the church, either through ignorance or baseness, found fault with his work; and although the price originally agreed upon had been very moderate, they alleged that it was far above the merit of the artist, and forced him to accept of the paltry sum of 200 livres; which, to add to the indignity, they paid him in copper money. To carry home this unworthy load to his indigent wife and children, poor Corregio had to travel six or eight miles from Parma. 1he weight of his burden, the heat of the weather, and chagrin at this villanous treatment, immediately threw him into a pleurisy, which in three days put an end to his life and his misfortunes.

For the preservation of this magnificent work the world is indebted to Titian. As he passed through Parma, in the suite of Charles V., he ran instantly to see the chef d’oeuvre of Corregio. While he was attentively viewing it, one of the principal canons of the church told him that such a grotesque performance did not merit his notice, and that they intended soon to have the whole defaced. “Have a care of what you do,” replied the other; “if I were not Titian, I should certainly wish to be Corregio.”

Corregio’s exclamation upon viewing a picture by Raphael is well known. Having long been accustomed to hear the most unbounded applause bestowed on the works of that divine painter, he by degrees became less desirous than afraid of seeing any of them. One, however, he at last had occasion to see. He examined it attentively for some minutes in profound silence; and then with an air of satisfaction exclaimed, I am still a painter. Julio Romano, on seeing some of Corregio’s pictures at Parma, declared they were superior to any thing in painting he had yet beheld. One of these, no doubt, was the famous Virgin and Child, with Mary Magdalen and St Jerome; but whether our readers are to depend upon his opinion, or upon that of Lady Millar, who in her Letters from Italy gives a very unfavourable account of it, we shall not presume to determine. This lady, however, speaks in a very different style of the no less famous Notte or Night of Corregio, of which she saw only a copy in the duke’s palace at Modena, the original having been sold for a great sum of money to the king of Poland. “It surprises me very much,” she says, “to see how different the characters are in this picture from that which I already have described to you. The subject is a Nativity; and the extraordinary beauty of this picture proceeds from the clair obscure. There are two different lights introduced, by means of which the personages are visible; namely, the light proceeding from the body of the child, and the moonlight. These two are preserved distinct, and produce a most wonderful effect. The child’s body is so luminous, that the superficies is nearly transparent, and the rays of light emitted by it are verified in the effect they produce upon the surrounding objects. They are not rays distinct and separate, like those round the face of a sun that indicates an insurance office; nor linear, like those proceeding from the man in the almanack; but of dazzling brightness; by their light you see clearly the face, neck, and hands, of the virgin (the rest of the person being in strong shadow), the faces of the pastori who crowd round the child, and particularly one woman, who holds her hand before her face, lest her eyes should be so dazzled as to prevent her from beholding the infant. This is a beautiful natural action, and is most ingeniously introduced. The straw on which the child is laid appears gilt, from the light of his body shining on it. The moon lights up the back ground of the picture, which represents a landscape. Every object is distinct, as in a bright moonlight night; and there cannot be two lights in nature more different than those which appear in the same picture. The virgin and the child are of the most perfect beauty. There is a great variety of character in the different .persons present, yet that uniformity common to all herdsmen and peasants. In short, this copy is so admirable, that I was quite sorry to be obliged to lose sight of it so soon; but I never shall forget it. The duke of Modena, for whom Corregio did the original picture, gave him only 600 livres of France for it,—a great sum in those days; but at present what ought it to cost ?” This great painter’s death happened in 1534.
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Allegri, Gregorio, an ecclesiastic by profession, and a celebrated composer of music of the seventeenth century, ,was a native of Rome. He was the disciple of Nanini, the intimate friend and contemporary of Palestrina. His abilities as a singer were not remarkable, but he was deemed an excellent master of harmony; and so much respected by all the musical professors of his time, that the pope, in the year 1629, appointed him to be one of the singers of his chapel. To his uncommon merit as a composer of church music he united an excellent moral character, exhibiting in his actions the devotion and benevolence of his heart. The poor crowded daily to his door, whom he relieved to the utmost of his ability; and not content with these beneficent actions, he daily visited the prisons of Rome, in order to relieve the most deserving and afflicted objects which were immured in these dreary mansions. With such divine simplicity and purity of harmony did he compose many parts of the church service, that his loss was severely felt and sincerely lamented by the whole college of singers in the papal service. He died on the 18th February 1650, and was interred in the Chiesa Nuova, in ā vault destined for the reception of deceased singers in the pope’s chapel, before the chapel of S. Filippo Neri, near the altar of annunciation.

Among his other musical works preserved in the pontifical chapel, is the celebrated Miserere, which, for 170 years, has been annually performed at that chapel on Wednesday and Good Friday, in Passion week, by the choral band, and the best singers in Italy. It is, however, generally believed that it owes its reputation more to the manner in which it is performed, than to the composition itself. The beauty and effect of the music is not discernible upon paper, but the singers have, by tradition, certain customs, expressions, and graces of convention, which produce wonderful effects. Some of the effects produced may be justly attributed to the time, the place, and the solemnity of the ceremonials observed during the performance. “The pope and conclave are all prostrated on the ground, the candles of the chapel and the torches of the balustrade are extinguished one by one, and the last verse of this psalm is terminated by two choirs; the maestro di cappella beating time slower and slower, and the singers diminishing or rather extinguishing the harmony by little and little, to a perfect point.” Padre Martini says, that there was never more than three copies made by authority, “one of which was for the emperor Leopold, one for the late king of Portugal, and the other for himself; but a very complete one was presented by the pope himself to King George III. as an inestimable curiosity.” {Gen. Biog.)