Thanks for testing that!
I may have figured it out, tho I'm going to talk to my dealer about it.
The manual says you can't rename an album that's currently playing, but that appears to be incorrect. Instead, it appears that you can only rename an album when you first load it into the hard drive (whether it's playing or not). Apparently, after a certain amount of time - or, more likely, when you start loading another album, you lose the ability to rename it. (Still trying to figure out exactly what ends the sacred "window of opportunity to rename.")
So that means that, to rename an album down the road, I'll have to delete it, and then reload it.
I cannot imagine why you wouldn't be able to do that at any time. Makes no sense. Honestly, I think the iDrive was programmed by the proverbial roomful of monkeys.