A New Edition of Anlun Huang's A Requiem in Chinese with an English Translation and International Phonetic Alphabet Transliteration

Abstract

Anlun Huang’s (b. 1949) A Requiem in Chinese is the only large, unaccompanied,mixed-voice choral requiem in Chinese history. It was completed in May 2004 and the premiere was conducted by the composer on September 12, 2004. Despite the fact that a large unaccompanied requiem in traditional Western style with Chinese liturgical text is unique in both Western and Eastern music of the twenty-first century, the work has received little international attention and only a small number of performances. It is my belief that the difficulty of Mandarin pronunciation and the understanding of the Chinese text are the main obstacles to learning and performing this piece for non-Mandarin-speaking choirs. I have provided an English translation of the text and a new edition of the work featuring an International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) transliteration of the text, making the work more accessible and allowing it to be widely studied and performed.