The late 1970s are considered a turning point in the musical career of Arvo Pärt. Having tired of the serial and collage techniques that had produced such works as Perpetuum mobile and Collage über B-A-C-H, Pärt had removed himself from public composition for several years in order to develop new compositional approaches. In 1976 he emerged with an entirely new compositional method, as demonstrated by works like Pari intervallo and Trivium. The following year saw the development and refinement of this technique, making it address more directly the textual structure of sung music. Like Cantate Domino and Summa, both of which were composed in 1977, Missa Sillabica from the same year demonstrates Pärt's developing sense of text setting within his new compositional style.

Taking it name from tintinnabulum (the Latin word for "bell"), the new "tintinnabula" style (as it came to be known) combined the serialist idea of a meticulous musical process with an ever-present tonal center. This was accomplished by pairing two kinds of voices which Paul Hillier, in his authoritative book on Pärt, conveniently calls M-voices and T-voices. M-voices (for "melodic") move within diatonic scales in stepwise fashion, always centering on or around some central pitch. These voices are set in counterpoint to T-voices (for "tintinnabula"), which may leap above or below the melodic line, but which must always confine themselves to pitches within the tonic triad. The two voices interact according to a careful set of rules, the T-voice perhaps leaping alternately to the first tonic chord tone above, then below, the M-voice pitch. The result is a harmonic landscape in which the tonic is always prominent, but which sets all dissonances in striking vertical relief to the omnipresent tonal center. The important development in the works of 1977, especially Missa Sillabica, is the marriage of the syllabic structures of the text to the contour of the melodic lines.

A perfect example of this technique can be found in the tenor divisi passage that opens the Kyrie. The tonal center is D minor, which is sustained by the arpeggiated tintinnabula notes in the first two bars of the first tenor part. The second tenors take the melodic line, which also centers on D. The second tenors' line is constructed so that the last syllable of each word descends to the D. Thus the three syllables of the first word, "Ky-ri-e," are sung by the second tenors on the descending line F-E-D. The second word, "e-le-i-son," fills out a four-note descent: G-F-E-D. The tintinnabula line in the first tenor part alternates between the nearest chord-tone below the melodic line and the nearest above it. Thus, the melodic line G-F-E-D in the second tenors is set in counterpoint with A (above the G)-D (below the F)-F (above the E)-A (below the D). In the subsequent phrase, the roles are maintained but the rules are reversed: the melodic line ascends to the D, and the tintinnabular line goes above then below.

This structure develops further as the piece continues. In the middle of the Credo, for example, the second altos and second sopranos are both given M-lines, but the altos descend to D on each word while the sopranos ascend. These are paired with a pair of T-voices that likewise move in contrary motion as they outline the tonic chord. The effect of this technique is a texture that is at once tonally grounded and lush with harmonic variety, and an attitude towards the text that is both austere and reverent.

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