I remember distinctly hearing my cousins at St. James’s Hall when they sang in Verdi’s Requiem. Their voices blended quite beautifully in the lovely “Agnus Dei”; the opening phrase sung in octaves by the soprano and contralto affected me strongly. I did not know it at all at that time, and well though I know it now, that “Agnus Dei” always touches me by its purity and simplicity and strong religious feeling.