Elgar : an anniversary portrait
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
Elgar : an anniversary portrait
Continuum, 2007
Available at 3 libraries
Note
Includes bibliographical references and index
Contents of Works
- Orchestrating his own life : Sir Edward Elgar as a historical personality / David Cannadine
- Elgar's biography, Elgar's repute : themes and variations / Julian Rushton
- A view from 1955 / Diana McVeagh
- Elgar the Catholic / Stephen Hough
- Elgar in manuscript / Robert Anderson
- Elgar the composer / Christopher Kent
- Elgar the Progressive / Hans Keller
- Elgar's church music / Adrian Partington
- A sixth Pomp and circumstance march / Anthony Payne
- Conducting Elgar / Mark Elder in conversation with Richard Morrison
- The role of the Angel in "The dream of Gerontius" / Janet Baker
- Sir Edward Elgar : my musical grandfather / Yehudi Menuhin
- The violin concerto / Tasmin Little
- The cello concerto : Jacqueline du Pré's recordings / Andrew Keener
- An honoured trust : the Elgar foundation and the birthplace museum / Michael Messenger
Description and Table of Contents
Description
June 2007 marks the 150th anniversary of the birth of Sir Edward Elgar. Here, to mark the occasion, is a collection of new essays by a distinguished group of contributors. They deal with Elgar the Man and Composer, as well as with issues connected to Elgar's lasting legacy and to the performance of his music. Elgar was a man of many contradictions. He was born an outsider, into a family of lower-middle class, Catholic, origins. Yet his fame, and ability to write music that struck a chord in the national consciousness, led him to adopt a sycophantic attitude towards the Royal Family and high society, even though he always felt ill at ease with them. Elgar was a depressive with a problematic marriage, who craved recognition, but in many ways he regretted the piece of music which made him famous. 'Pomp and Circumstance' made him the leading English composer of his age, but also contributed to the jingoism which he so disliked during the First World War. Yet, unquestionably, he was the greatest musical genius that England had produced in centuries.
This "Anniversary Portrait", by some of the scholars and musicians that understand him best, offers interesting new light on a wide range of aspects of Edward Elgar's life and work. Richard Strauss' famous toast to Elgar in 1902 - to the welfare and success of the first English progressivist - looks startling today. Is not Elgar the last embodiment of a fading Empire, a composer of late romantic music that even for its period was behind the times? That cliched view has become ever more inadequate over a period when Elgar's music has increasingly been performed and acknowledged internationally.
Table of Contents
- Introduction
- Some Thoughts on Elgar Donald Mitchell
- Elgar the Progressive Hans Keller
- Elgar My Musical Grandfather Yehudi Menuhin
- Elgar's Catholicism Stephen Hough
- The Angel in Gerontius Dame Janet Baker
- Elgar's Church Music James O'Donnell (Westminster Abbey)
- Elgar the Composer Professor Christopher Kent
- Elgar A New Perspective Professor David Cannadine
- The New Pomp and Circumstance March Anthony Payne
- The Biographies Julian Rushton
- Elgar in Manuscript Robert Anderson
- Elgar ands the First World War Nicholas Kenyon
- Recording Elgar Andrew Keener.
by "Nielsen BookData"