Robert Peters wrote:

>2) I love church chants and listen very often to music by Josquin,
>Hildegard, Perotin and the likes.  It is soothing, meditative music which
>speaks of a mysterious and moving faith.  But this world is this world:
>religion has always been political.  Take a piece like Mozart's Coronation
>Mass.  It is religious music and speaks of faith.  But it is written for
>a political occasion (a coronation) and it is not meant to criticize the
>crowned ruler.  Church and monarchy go hand in hand and the artist is the
>servant who celebrates both.  (Examples from worldly music: Britten's
>"Gloriana" for Elizabeth II, Monteverdi's "Orfeo" for the Duke of Mantua)
>So artists served all the time for the mighty, often were paid by them,
>gave them music, usable as and sometimes actually designed to be
>"propaganda", as I want to call it.

I'm not sure these are the best examples to cite.  Isn't the coronation
of the Coronation Mass the coronation of a statue of the Virgin? (so it
says in the notes to my recording of the work).  And while 'Gloriana' was
a commission to celebrate the coronation of Elizabeth II, it was not well
received at the time because it focused on the first Elizabeth's weakness
and the struggles in her personal life rather than on the achievements of
her reign.  Britten was not the first composer to fulfil his own artistic
ends while writing a commission to specifications which might appear to
conflict with them; it's often quite unclear where the need to please a
patron takes over from the composer's own best judgement.

Virginia Knight
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http://www.ilrt.bris.ac.uk/~ggvhk/virginia.html