«Tardi t’amai» was born in 1980 from an improvisation on the organ. Today Leo XIV sings it in papal audiences
The year was 1980. In a room ofAugustinianum Patristic Institute of Rome, the fingers of a young priest slid over the keys of an organ. The notes, experimental, sounded without a score, but in a harmonious way. D minor, C, A minor, D minor, B flat, G minor. From those improvised agreements something was born that no one, at that moment, would have imagined could reach the halls of the Apostolic Palace.
The protagonist of this story is Father Antonio BaldoniAugustinian religious, who was looking for a melody for one of the most intense and poetic prayers of that spiritual masterpiece which are the Confessions of Saint Augustine: «Late I loved you, beauty so ancient and so new, late I loved you». Words with which the bishop of Hippo acknowledges having searched for God for a long time, and taking the wrong path for a long time, before finding it. From that ancient text, Father Antonio derived four verses and decided to set them to music. Thus the song was born I loved you late.
Worldwide diffusion
Baldoni arrived at the Augustinianum in 1979, a guest of the Santa Monica International College. Here, he had put together a small band, made up of friars of different nationalities. In 1981, when he left Rome, among the new students of the College there was a new brother who had arrived from the United States. A rather well-known name today: that of Robert Francis Prevost. The two just crossed paths at the time, but would meet again many years later.
Over the following decades, singing continued to grow in popularity. It became a real one hymn for the Order of Saint Augustineadopted by nuns, nuns of aggregate congregations and lay people of the Augustinian world. It was translated into multiple languages, performed in different versions, broadcast on video on all five continents.
Leo XIV and «I loved you late»
Today, when the groups in audience at the Vatican they intone I loved you lateeven Leo XIV sings the words, with a transport that only a profound Augustinian like the Pontiff can feel. Then, finally, the meeting, last November 5th, during a general audience.
Father Baldoni’s work is not limited to a single song, even though it is clearly the best known. No, over the years he continued to set the bishop of Hippo’s texts to music, combining the composition with the writing of notebooks of spiritual reflections. One of these, The spiritual paths of manchose to bring it as a gift to Leo XIV during that November meeting.
