On Sun, 17 Jun 2001, Janice Lane wrote:
> Thanks, Nigel, for some very interesting postings. Hearing from old friends
> and new ones is good.
> For my bit, I'm still concerned with Scott-Skinner. So many tunes are named
> "Mrs. Somebody's Favourite" How does this come about? Does the old dear
> express her liking for an unnamed tune and from then on it becomes hers? Or
> does the composer think "I'll name a tune for her and she'll give me lots of
> money"?
> I think it must be the latter, but what happens if the "Somebody" person
> doesn't like the tune?
I think that tradition goes way back before Skinner. The Gow's
used to do that all the time. Some say that some of those tunes that the
Gow's named "Mrs. Fiona Grant", or "Mrs. Catherine MacDonald" (those aren't real
tunes, but they could be) weren't actually written by them. We'll not go
there :-)
Toby
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