Margaret Mikulska wrote:

>When Mozart's Requiem became popular - which was shortly after his death
>- in Northern Germany editions with German text substituted for the Latin
>text appeared, to make the work suitable for performance in Lutheran
>liturgy.  I don't know, however, whether it was a plain translation or not.
>But it had to be in German.

A lot of Latin church music was performed in English in Church of England
churches until well into the 20th century, though I don't think there was
ever a total prohibition on Latin.  Sadly, clergy often don't bother to
tell congregations what the words mean when a Latin anthem is performed.
I've also come across English 'translations' of Latin words in performing
editions which bear slight relation to the Latin.  The Novello edition of
Mozart's Coronation Mass is a case in point, and a Stabat Mater (forget
whose) whose English version omitted all reference to the Virgin Mary.

Doris Howe:

>I think to enjoy some music it has to have been part of one's own practical
>musical experience.  Anyone else find this so?

Yes, there are some pieces I like only because of the pleasant memories of
occasions when I've performed them and which don't have much musical merit
in themselves.  Others (like the Saint-Saens) which I've found better to
perform than to listen to.  Others again which I like listening to but
which I've only really come to know well by performing them.

Christine Labroche:

>May I ask which one it was? I believe he wrote three, but I only know the
>one he wrote in memory of Bellini in 1835, which he did complete although
>the first acknowledged public rendering was tardily in Bergamo in 1870.

I think it was the Bellini one, though I found out by asking my husband who
was nearer to the radio at the time and heard the preceding announcement.
If it's complete (and not reconstructed by additions from less gifted
composers) I'm surprised it isn't performed more often.

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