Elgar rediscovered

EW

Every time I hear the Pomp and Circumstance, I want to go out and reclaim the Empire.

When I was a boy, 25% of the globe was pink, a colour that struck pride in your heart and wanted you to go out and make it 50%.

Today pink conjours up images of bloody useless socialists who couldn't organise a copulation in a brothel.

I shall play it tonight whilst I eat my dinner.

Regards

Mick

Dear EW,

Thanks for starting this thread - I was probably going to start something along similar lines this evening (I'm just about to head off to a performance of the Kingdom, which I've never before heard - so if it's good I may well return wanting CD recommendations, though a glance in the penguin guide suggests to me that Fredrik will tell me to search out Boult!).

You mention the Davis cycle (available on LSO Live). It is certainly dirt cheap (around £15 for the lot) and has Payne's completion of number 3. However, I wasn't bowled over by it (and haven't got round to giving it a second go). That said, I don't know if that's just because the music isn't quite for me, since I don't have any other sets to compare it to, and don't know the works so well.

My favourite Elgar recording is probably the Sea Pictures with Janet Baker, Barbirolli and the LSO.

regards, Tam

Hello EW and Tam,

have you tried the Elgar symphonies by Bryden Thompson on chandos? Whilst the Boult/Barborolli/Davis/and Naxos recordings are very good thereis something special about the chandos ones.
Boult conducting the Kingdom and the Apostles really takes dome beating though.

Cheers

Mark.

Dear EW,

I go through some periods of doubt about Elgar, but then I come back, transfixed by it.

Really I would like to send you to the Elgar entry in my Record Library Thread. Edward Downes and the BBC Philharmonic are simply the tops in my view in the Second Symphony on Naxos, which company also released the First Symphony in my other favourite! George Hurst with the same Orchestra!

In the First I also have a 1976 live Boult reading with the BBC SO which is phenomenal, as his 1949 studio recording with the LPO. Equally his 1944 78 record of the Second is another most recomendable recording, again withe the BBC SO.

I could go on, but really suggest you hunt out that old Thread, and have a look. There is nothing duff left in it! If you want to question me on the nature of any of the performances there, I would happy give a thumbnail sketch of what they are like...


Happy listening dear EW from Fred!

Hello Fred,

the Elgar/Payne 3 on Naxos is also an excellent version, and the best i have heard.

Cheers

Mark.

quote:

Originally posted by Fredrik_Fiske:
I go through some periods of doubt about Elgar, but then I come back, transfixed by it.

Me too! Exactly!

There's no doubting the art of a man who could write that accompanied cadenza in the finale of the violin concerto, although I tend to wish he hadn't bothered with the lugubrious and (by his standards) unimaginative cello concerto. I love the 2 symphonies, and I certainly agree about Edward Downes's recording on Naxos. I heard him do it live with the BBC Phil in Hanley about a year after the recording was made, and it was just stunning.

I'm pretty well stocked up on the classic recordings, I was really wondering about those that have been made in the last ten years, while I've assiduously been neglecting poor Sir Edward!

EW

Dear EW,

I was lucky enough to be in Worcester Cathedral when Downes and the BBC Phil played the Second Symphony (Berg Violin Concert before the paus). and if you look you will see I coaght the Prom broadcast with a recorder a fortnight later. Then Naxos made the commercial recording! Magic moments indeed.

The trouble for me is that these two Naxos recordings is that Elgar seem more misunderstood now than in the time of Boult, Barbirolli and Sargent, and other luminaries, including the unlikely sounding comination of the LPO and Edward van Beinum!

Mark Elder is okay, but I can tell you from people who have played under him, that all is not quite as fine as it might appear on first encounter. Colin Davis, especially live, might be good!

Fred

quote:

Originally posted by Fredrik_Fiske:
Mark Elder is okay, but I can tell you from people who have played under him, that all is not quite as fine as it might appear on first encounter.

I still haven't got round to having a listen to him with his revamped Halle. The concerts I attended towards the end of Kent Nagano's premiership with them put me off hearing them ever again! (I still cringe when I think back to the last concert of theirs I went to, Nagano conducting Tchaik No.6... I don't think the orchestra played a single bar with any kind of ensemble, and the string playing and overall sound was just depressing.) Last I heard, Mark Elder had sacked half the string section and hired a load of attractive young ladies! A man after my own heart...!!

On the subject of string playing, I'm rifling through my CD collection looking for Andrew Davies's recording of Elgar's Introduuction and Allegro - that "devil of a fugue" has been going round my head all day and I can't find a recording ANYWHERE... I certainly used to have some, I hope they aren't part of a growing number of CDs I lent out and never got back...

EW

I have three splendid recordings of the Intoduction and Allegro; Barbirolli in 1927, and again in about 1963 (Great Recordings Of The Century), and The National Youth Orchestra on IMP Pickwick from about 1988. The last one is the best!

The early one is fascinating (and got Elgar's approval at the time - fascinating that he showed any wish to record the work himself, and expressed real surprise that Barbirolli brought out how big, the pieces is!), and is on a tiny chamber orchestra, and is very muscular and strong, while the EMI CD is the most beautiful as to sonority.

It is a great piece, in my view. Fred

quote:

Originally posted by Fredrik_Fiske:
It is a great piece, in my view. Fred

It certainly is, it looks like I'm going to have to add it to my shopping list since I can't find a recording of it ANYWHERE...!

Well, I'm just back from hearing The Kingdom and what a stunning work it is. I've never personally been a huge fan of Elgar, but listening to this I can't for the life of me thing why not. It had me right from the opening bars (indeed, parts of the prelude moved me almost to tears) and the Edinburgh Choral Union provided some of the finest choral singing I've heard in ages. And some fine playing from Brabbins and the BBC Scottish (a combination I've not heard before, though it does reinforce my view of just how fine an orchestra they are). What a shame the Beeb wasn't on hand to record the thing.

I urge forum members to look out for the work and would be much obliged for any recommendations of recordings.

regards, Tam

Boult on EMI, is wonderful. He also recorded the Apostles, but this is a looser work, and the Kingdom is the place to start. Boult's Apostles recording is still quite arguably the finist yet as well.

Thois is not to denegrate more recent efforts, and Hickock's readings are splendid to, but I am not sure is they one records yet. Fredrik

Newly Edited Version!

Boult on EMI, is wonderful. He also recorded the Apostles, but this is a looser work, and the Kingdom is the place to start. Boult's Apostles recording is still quite arguably the finest yet as well.

This is not to denegrate more recent efforts, and Hickock's readings are splendid to, but I am not sure if they are on records yet. Fredrik