I had read descriptions of, and discussions on Thomas Tallis's music in the Richard Powers's novel "In The Time of Our Singing", earlier this December but I had never gotten round to looking Tallis up until this afternoon. This is okay because "Spem In Alium", a choral piece Tallis wrote for eight five-person choirs, i.e., forty people, is a breathtaking classical piece to discover, and listen to, on the first day of the year. Listen to Tallis Singers perform this nine minute long piece (the embedded audio file is down on the page), and begin in a space of beauty.