Mihi/Miki: how common

amindthatsuits

I was talking with a particularly brilliant music undergrad who spent the August break boning up on Ukrainian chant, so well formed is he. He was under the impression that "miki" was a German pronunciation for "mihi." I told him that it was in the pronunciation guide in the Liber Usualis and is correct for mihi and nihil. He sneered, the way only undergraduates can, that "we talk about "nihilism," not "nikilism."" I pointed out that we speak English.

Anyway, listening to recordings, of course, I hear everything, and I mean everything. My program director (in another department) said something about how I should hear what the French do to the "u" in chant, and I said that umlaut was quite famous--and a source of amusement to me. (She is Francophone and spends a good part of each year in France. A French teenager once expostulated with me that they do not do that, so of course I said "Yes, yooooo dooooo.") And, as Prof. Mahrt told the Colloquium one year, choirs tend to slip into nationally distinct pronunciation quite regularly.

So--in practice--how common is the "nikil" and "miki?" I am not sure I have heard it that often even in all the recordings I listen to.
Kenneth

Ragueneau

In some Mediæval MSS, "mihi" is written as "michi."

The "h" can be pronounced as "h" in "human." Many guides recommend this.

The French, in particular, don't like to aspirate, and will say something coming close to "miki" or "nikil," but (strangely) don't say "vekementer" for "vehementer."

lautzef

"H" is also silent in Italian, so if you don't pronounce it "miki" or something approaching that, it sounds just like "mi." I do use 'miki,' which some of our choir members do not like. I think words need to be understood, and in a big acoustic, especially, the 'k' is not as frightful as it might be and makes the word understandable. I suspect your brilliant music undergrad needs to learn a thing or two about acoustics, and the difference between sung and spoken language.

Andrew Motyka

I learned that "mihi" and "nihil" are the only exceptions to the silent H rule because they are directly borrowed from Greek.

SkirpR

Unless one has a significant academic reason - for example, following some highly-researched European local variant of Latin pronunciation - one should follow the standard Latin pronunciation guide as given in the Liber (and other places). Particularly for use in the liturgy.

ScottKChicago

I think SkirpR is right: there's a definite right answer for church Latin, but now that I type this I'm thinking of the differences in how, for instance, German-speaking people pronounce church Latin (kvee for qui, etc.). But MEE-kee is the standard I've always seen for mihi. Choir directors have usually asked that the "k" not be overdone.

ScottKChicago

Besides, Mozart's naughty joke in K. 559 depends on mihi being pronounced with a k sound: Difficile lectu mihi mars et jonicu difficile.

Written in fake Latin but meant to be heard in German, where it's bawdy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Difficile_lectu_(Mozart)

Gavin

A wonderful canon, second only to K 231.

amindthatsuits

"Kvee" is how the Holy Father pronounces "qui." I've heard him.

Actually, they make fun of his Italian. "KVEEE sentiamo la KRRRRAAANNNdissima CHoya."

And he makes fun of them. "Tutti i pelegrini qui sono qui in RRRRROOOOOOOOMMMMAAAAA" with that outward stretched hand the Romans use at the end of every sentence. It's a very cute little ritual.

amindthatsuits

The note about how "miki" sounds depending on the acoustical setting is good.

Of course, the omincompetent 21-year-old thinks he is also omniscient. He's a kid. But, yes, he is a keyboard major and a composition and conducting minor, so I suspect his practical experience conducting is limited to the school settings and the parish where he plays.

Liam

Another approach in a schola is to have only one voice in each part make the articulation....

Protasius

Regarding the initial post, the common pronunciation in Germany is neither [nikil] nor [niχil] but [nihil], and analog for mihi.

Richard Mix

Iirc, Harold Copeman's modern informants were divided about [mihi] vs [miçi] in a German-Latin context; the latter is favored locally by SF Bay HIP ensembles. [Mixi] I think I've never heard; [miki] only once by a non-German Bach Magnificat soloist. On the other hand I know of no choir that doesn't use [miki] and [nikil] in 'standard' Latin.

SamuelDorlaque

It's just easier and more consistent to follow the rules for pronunciation of "Ecclesiastical Latin" in the Liber Usualis. I'd use "historic/regional" pronunciations in
an academic or musicological environment but in the liturgy we sing the "ecclesiastical"
Latin. To modern ears, hearing Byrd sung in Tudor-English Latin in the liturgy is "a tad too quaint"; but, in an academic historic performance practice, it would seem "quite right."

Protasius

In my church in Germany we always follow the german pronunciation because the people singing the ordinary won't do something other and it sounds really odd to switch between the italianate ecclesiastical pronunciation and the german pronunciation.

Adam Wood

This anecdote would be better if I remembered the details....

I seem to recall reading (on the Cafe, I believe) about a famous director of polyphony who was asked about historically informed pronunciation of Latin within his choir, to which he responded that they only sing it like that because they don't listen to him.

Charles in CenCA

FWIW, I know this came up at a byegone colloquium (Chi or Pitt I remember not) in Scott Turkington's schola rehearsals. IIRC, Turk insisted upon "k." As it was rehearsal, he didn't linger on the subject at all, and he was the director. This could be a false recollection, unintended if so.

Ragueneau

I think the "k" pronunciation is pretty common.

SkirpR

In my church in Germany we always follow the german pronunciation because the people singing the ordinary won't do something other and it sounds really odd to switch between the italianate ecclesiastical pronunciation and the german pronunciation.

I would not be offended by a German congregation using German Latin. It is, in that case, authentic. American English has no cultural connection with a specific living pronunciation of Latin, so when I made my previous comment about using "Ecclesiastical Latin" for the liturgy, I was speaking particularly with Americans in mind!

Adam Wood

>>American English has no cultural connection with a specific living pronunciation of Latin

Really? Then how come everyone in my choir pronounces Latin the same wrong way?

Gavin

Adam: I recall that comment, and I think it was from someone who posted here. It was a choir at Notre Dame cathedral conducted by a famous French early music conductor. Don't remember the names.

amindthatsuits

I missed something being gone. The comment about American pronunciation is peculiar in the extreme. Many American accents are closer to old English accents than is the Oxbridge Accent the "R.P.," a modern and quite artificial accent. American culture grew organically out of Anglo-Saxon culture, which is very, very old. Catholic schools taught Latin from the founding of Maryland, and there is, separately, a rich tradition of studying Latin that went into the Founding and lived for many years beyond.Classes were taught in Latin here at CUA until the 1950's that I know of. So if variants from Ecclesiastical Latin are allowed on the basis of "living tradition," ours deserves as much respect. Besides, how many German choirs are tied directly to a continuous line of pronunciation of Latin? Don't Germans who learned Latin just to sing make just German mistakes, and NOT somehow mystically pronounce it the way some Albrecht or other pronounced it in 1173? And a popular chant movement got its start here, in the land where, Tocqueville commented long ago, people will form an association about ANYTHING. So your definition of "authentic" escapes me.

amindthatsuits

That said, do what Scott Turkington says. Period. At the colloquium I attended, Prof. Mahrt discussed it solely in terms of what happens when singers don't pay attention--they sing the way they talk.

GiuseppeDaCopertino

I use the "miki" pronunciation and when directing have the choir use it as well.

Ioannes Andreades

One should keep in mind that even if one encounters michi/miki and nichil/nikil in chant manuscripts, this is not generally the case in all medieval Christian writings and manuscripts. From what I've seen, it is more common in musical manuscripts, so one should avoid calling such spelling or pronunciation "ecclesiastical." My hunch is that what is going on is that the words nihil and mihi were generally pronounced as monosyllabic words in the Middle Ages, as the alternative spellings nil and mi are very common and go back to classical times (both words are wholly Latin and have no Greek derivation; for a similar intervocalic loss of h, cf. comprendere and comprehendere). The c or k was probably introduced to make sure that singers pronounced both words as disyllabics as the composers of the chants intended. Whether the c/k was intended to be pronounced when it was introduced is a question I can't answer.

Re: the Holy Father's pronunciation of words such as "qui", as the unvoiced labio-velar does not exist in German, it's probably not a historically conditioned German variation of pronunciation as much as a best attempt. Even German words such as Quelle are pronounced /kvelle/.

Chris Allen

I've always used "meekee" and "neekeel," though from time to time I'm tempted to switch to the "classical" pronunciation (mih-hih, nih-hill) just for giggles, especially for the Salve Regina ("Sahl-way Ray-ghee-nah, mah-tair miss-air-rih-cor-dih-eye....")

Adam Wood

Sahl-way?

I had a Latin teacher in HS who was completely appalled at "Kikerik" (Ciceric / Classical) pronunciation:
"Ceasar did not say Weenie, Weedy, Weakie!"

Liam

Ceasar perhaps didn't, but Caesar might have....

Salieri

Classical Latin always reminds me of Elmer Fudd...

amindthatsuits

It's been so long since I heard classical Latin--I learned it at an Episcopal High School, where EVERYTHING was Anglophile, of course--that I had forgotten it. It's a German system. There is a ton of research on it that probably upends the Erasmian system but does not support the idea that Romans spoke like Italians--but I speak Italian and you can never convince an Italian that Caesar was not Cesare.

And the Holy Father's Italian pronunciation is considered unqualifiedly adorable by every devout Italian Catholic---they all have imitations of him. Very cute. His Italian writing is flawless and beautiful, but the pronunciation is strictly Uncle Ludwig. I suspect that conquering "qui" by a German vocalist is something of a triumph, as when I learned to pronounce the Italian "tt."

amindthatsuits

My tone on my thing on American pronunciation MAY have been a little harsh, but I don't like those kind of comments directed at Americans. The European system may be bringing itself to the point of collapse for the fourth time in 140 years, and they don't go to Church in large numbers, so where Europhilia comes from is beyond me. Love all the various parts of it, but they are as human as the rest of us.

amindthatsuits

And I love American culture---the moral parts of it.

amindthatsuits

I get updates from Rolling Stone every day that remind of virtually everything foul and pornographic about American culture.

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