Edward Elgar (1857–1934)

On 24th May 1911, the year of Mahler’s death and Sibelius’s Fourth Symphony, the Second Symphony of Elgar had its first performance at the Queen’s Hall, London, with the composer conducting the 130-strong Queen’s Hall Orchestra. It was a dispiriting occasion, the audience being very small and unexpectedly cool in its reception. Elgar was hurt and remembered it with bitterness even twenty years later. Now, however, there is not the slightest doubt about its stature and importance in show more the history of British music. It is dedicated to the memory of King Edward VII, who had died while the work was in the early stage of composition. Its spiritual essence lies in the quotation from Shelley which heads the score: .... ‘Rarely, rarely comest thou, Spirit of Delight!’... though many listeners have been puzzled to know which way to take this: it depends on one’s personal attitude towards Elgar’s music and the age it symbolises.

It begins with a magnificent, flamboyant gesture: supremely confident, imperial, noble and lofty in sentiment. As with the First Symphony though, there are undertones of self-doubt, conflict, insecurity and immense yearning. An episode in the first movement, an intense singing tune played by the cellos has a sinister quality which Elgar described as a "sort of malign influence wandering through the summer night in the garden", and - to those old enough to remember the summer of 1939 - so acutely seemed to recapture this mood just before the outbreak of a second world conflict, as indeed it might well have invoked in Elgar a similar premonition of what was so soon to come after 1911.

The second movement is a massive funeral march, said to have been occasioned by the untimely death of Alfred Rodewald, the Liverpool business-man and very accomplished amateur conductor who had been one of Elgar’s staunchest friends and source of encouragement. This march, however, has all the panoply of state mourning, bringing before one’s inner vision the picture of London and the funeral of the King himself. It is interesting to compare this with the not dissimilar funeral march, the opening movement of Mahler’s Fifth Symphony, alike in essentials of funeral solemnity but so different in national character. With Elgar there is a "smiling through the tears" dignity and consolation absent from the frenzied agony of Mahler’s more forceful utterance.

The scherzo is buoyant, but of nervous energy and its central episode is a soul-searching return to the "malign influence in the garden" from the first movement, now presented in a fearful, awe-inspiring and utterly overwhelming nightmare: Elgar said it was the "horrible throbbing in the head of some violent fever" - as if one were being trampled underfoot by the thunderous hooves of horses charging into battle. It could also be the pounding, inexorable rhythm of a train bearing down on one in the dark such as is recalled by Alfred Noyes: … "Leap, heart, for the pulse and the roar, and the lights of the streaming train, that leaps with the heart of thy love once more out of the mist and the rain. Out of the desolate years, the thundering pageant flows, but I see no more than a window of tears, which her face has turned to a rose" … Thus the twentieth century with its threat of war-like machines might also have been an unconscious awareness in Elgar’s creative imagination.

The last movement returns to a more self-assured, almost complacent, theme. This is developed at length, sometimes with rather too much repetition and a deal of Elgar’s undue obsession with sequential patterns. The ending promises to be grandiloquent, an apotheosis re-affirming greatness perhaps, but slowly the realisation dawns on the listener that it is not to be. Instead it ends calmly and reflectively, but assuredly for all that, like some radiant sunset, with the promise of a fine day tomorrow? The true essence of this ending however was perhaps never more eloquently expressed than by the late John Barbirolli, who - from personal experience of the time, no doubt - quoted the famous saying by Viscount Grey of Falloden who, on the evening of 3rd August 1914 when war was imminent, said: ... "The lights are going out all over Europe, we shall not see them lit again in our lifetime". Thus, the symphony, as it were, marked the closing of an era. show less

By the time Cockaigne appeared (1901), Elgar's style had matured, although that similarity to Strauss was still detectable. Elgar noted, in the score of this explicit evocation of contemporary London, that “Cockaigne” is traditionally the fictitious “Land of All Delights” (a.k.a. “The Abode of Luxury and Idleness”). Popularly associated with London, this description is thought to be the origin of “Cockney” (I bet that took some working out!). Elgar dedicated Cockaigne to his show more “many friends the members of British Orchestras”; the imaginative scoring, encompassing chamber-like filigree and bombastic military band, certainly gave every corner of the orchestra plenty to chew on.

Combining elements of sonata and rondo form, a (very!) rough thematic scheme might be (ABA-C-ABA-D)-(ABA-C)-(ACA-D)-(BA). The letters represent not repetition but use of themes (some of which are related). Dashes indicate rondo-like sections, while brackets highlight the sonata-like sequence of exposition, development, recapitulation and coda. Having thus diverted the analytically-minded, the rest of us can marvel at the brilliant way Elgar organises his materials to give the paradoxical impression of carefree whimsy (less well-assembled, it would be more wishy-washy than whimsical). Some episodes he associated with particular images. [A] is a “chirpy cockney” tune spawning [B], a nobilmente melody hinting at luxury. [C] is the dalliance of lovers in a park. Following [D] (that military band), an exquisite calm supposedly represents lovers wandering into a church seeking peace and quiet. show less

One of the few classical recordings that can be described as essential; Elgar shows what the cello is capable of and Du Pre holds nothing back.

Am I alone in getting a sense of irony in a coupling of Elgar's two major patriotic paeans of praise to England being performed by Scottish performers?