Elgar Concerto Showdown: the "Violin Concerto" vs. the "Cello Concerto"

[71 dB]

I would have certainly opted for the Elgar Collector's Edition on EMI had I not already owned 99% of its contents.

A twofer is about 6-7 % of 30 CDs, so you had already 93-94 % of it's content at most. 

I owned about half of the box, but I bough it anyway.

[Elgarian]

This is surprising to hear as the pieces as almost nothing alike. How can it be the instrument when the music is so different? It's like comparing spoons instead of fish soap and meat soup.

Yes, I feel similarly, and always have: I wouldn't think to compare them at all, really - except insofar as they are Elgar's two great concertos, so there's a natural inclination to consider them together (as we're doing here, and usefully, I think, because of the fact that we're all aware of the differences). But there the similarities end.

[Elgarian]

As for the Cello Concerto being more appealing than the Violin Concerto, I suppose the outward emotional intensity of the CC has had an impact on many listeners.

Someone mentioned earlier that Jacqueline du Pre may have had something to do with that, and understandably so - although from the moment I heard Beatrice Harrison I knew I was hooked on her (more restrained, but no less sensitive) approach for ever.

[Mirror Image]

Someone mentioned earlier that Jacqueline du Pre may have had something to do with that, and understandably so - although from the moment I heard Beatrice Harrison I knew I was hooked on her (more restrained, but no less sensitive) approach for ever.

Can't say I know Harrison's recording, but I'm not a fan of historical recordings in general.

[Cato]

This morning I listened to the Yehudi Menuhin performance of the Violin Concerto with the composer conducting.  At times I thought it might have been the Brahms Second Violin Concerto  0:).

Tomorrow I will crank up this:

https://www.youtube.com/v/XwMON0FsAaA

[Cato]

This morning I listened to the Yehudi Menuhin performance of the Violin Concerto with the composer conducting.  At times I thought it might have been the Brahms Second Violin Concerto  0:).

Tomorrow I will crank up this:

https://www.youtube.com/v/XwMON0FsAaA

Since it is now "tomorrow," I will comment on this.  The structure and orchestration of the Cello Concerto - which might also be mistaken for a (never-written) Brahms Cello Concerto - intrigued me more than that of the Violin Concerto...but not too much more.  0:)

Very difficult to choose!

Violin Concerto!  Something about the main motif embraces my aural soul a little more, or perhaps my contrarian nature is simply rising up... 

[mc ukrneal]

I haven't really commented much on this thread yet, mostly because I didn't really want to come down negatively on either work. I like both. But I feel the record is being distorted a bit.

First, the violin concerto was, according to what I have read, a success right away. The cello concerto, on the other hand, was a flop. So the idea that the violin concerto somehow has to peeled back with many listenings is not really accurate. It seems to have been loved immediately from its premiere and has been programmed by violinists ever since. The cello concerto was not a popular as it is today and it wasn't until some 50 years later that it's popularity took off. Personally, I don't find the violin concerto to be as interesting. I think the dark and stormy sound of the cello is much preferable to the violin, which is why I think I prefer the concerto so much more. I find the sound world more attractive despite their being written by the same composer.

Second, I do find the assessment that there is a difference in emotion to be fairly accurate. The violin concerto is more nobilimente in sentiment, thus noble and more positive. The tone of the cello, as I mentioned, is used to great effect to create quite the opposite sound world, so I can understand being drawn to the violin concerto if one prefers the brighter, happier world it creates. Of course, they both have elements of the other, but I talking the overall impact.

Third, I have never heard reference to the cello concerto as being Brahmsian in structure (though I have with the violin concerto). Is this something you've seen elsewhere or is it your own personal view?

[Cato]

Third, I have never heard reference to the cello concerto as being Brahmsian in structure (though I have with the violin concerto). Is this something you've seen elsewhere or is it your own personal view?

My own view, with the caveat that it seemed to me something that a 20th-century Brahms might have created, in the same sense that there is something Brahmsian about Schoenberg's Moses und Aron (and that was Georg Solti's opinion!).   

[Karl Henning]

I am apt to agree.  Like Schoenberg, Elgar is a subtle artist who learns creatively from several models.  If Gerontius seems to owe much to Wagner, the concerti do, I think, build upon Brahms.

[Elgarian]

I like both. But I feel the record is being distorted a bit.

First, the violin concerto was, according to what I have read, a success right away. The cello concerto, on the other hand, was a flop. So the idea that the violin concerto somehow has to peeled back with many listenings is not really accurate. It seems to have been loved immediately from its premiere and has been programmed by violinists ever since. The cello concerto was not a popular as it is today and it wasn't until some 50 years later that it's popularity took off.

Just adding that I don't think many of us were talking about the reception in general, but much more personally. Certainly I wouldn't want to claim any more than that it took me personally much longer to get anywhere near to the bottom of the VC (compared with the CC). The difference in time scales very likely has more to do with my temperament than Elgar's music.

My impression, on the other thing, is that Beatrice Harrison's performances of the CC were generally rapturously received, though I haven't studied their relative receptions in any detail, so can't comment more than that. (Certainly I receive her recorded performance rapturously!!)

I do find the assessment that there is a difference in emotion to be fairly accurate. The violin concerto is more nobilimente in sentiment, thus noble and more positive.

Just to say ... I don't hear it like this, myself - at least, not as an overall summary. To take the cadenza, for a moment ... that's as bleak as Elgar gets, I think - touching on the almost complete dissolution of hope. The bluff nobilmente section that takes over from it at the end reflects a kind of near-bravado, to my mind: 'enough of this introverted soul-searching ... let's get out and behave and confront the world and tweak our moustache!' So the nobilmente acts as a kind of foil to the harrowing introspection - I like to think of it as the 'public' elgar, while the windflowery stuff is very much the inner Elgar, longing for things he can't have. When it hits bottom, I find the VC reaches states that are even more painful than the CC reaches.

Of course I could just be telling myself stories. But it feels as if I get the stories from the music, and not the other way round.

[Mirror Image]

I haven't really commented much on this thread yet, mostly because I didn't really want to come down negatively on either work. I like both. But I feel the record is being distorted a bit.

First, the violin concerto was, according to what I have read, a success right away. The cello concerto, on the other hand, was a flop. So the idea that the violin concerto somehow has to peeled back with many listenings is not really accurate. It seems to have been loved immediately from its premiere and has been programmed by violinists ever since. The cello concerto was not a popular as it is today and it wasn't until some 50 years later that it's popularity took off. Personally, I don't find the violin concerto to be as interesting. I think the dark and stormy sound of the cello is much preferable to the violin, which is why I think I prefer the concerto so much more. I find the sound world more attractive despite their being written by the same composer.

Second, I do find the assessment that there is a difference in emotion to be fairly accurate. The violin concerto is more nobilimente in sentiment, thus noble and more positive. The tone of the cello, as I mentioned, is used to great effect to create quite the opposite sound world, so I can understand being drawn to the violin concerto if one prefers the brighter, happier world it creates. Of course, they both have elements of the other, but I talking the overall impact.

Third, I have never heard reference to the cello concerto as being Brahmsian in structure (though I have with the violin concerto). Is this something you've seen elsewhere or is it your own personal view?

The popularity of either work really has nothing to do with how it's perceived from listener to listener. I also don't agree with your analysis on the Violin Concerto. The Violin Concerto is a highly complex emotional work and I don't feel it's a 'brighter, happier world' than the Cello Concerto at all. I think there's a general misconception about the cello. Also, just because the cello has a darker tone, doesn't mean that the work that it's written for is going to project a darker sound-world. Elgar's VC has many dark moments that are just tinged with sadness and feelings of longing. The fact that Elgar goes through these emotional episodes in such a quick succession reveals more to me than one that stays in one general frame of mind (i. e. the Cello Concerto), but the CC isn't without it's complexities of course, it's just the VC's highly emotional sound-world requires more than a snap judgement.

[Sergeant Rock]

Also, just because the cello has a darker tone, doesn't mean that the work that it's written for is going to project a darker sound-world. Elgar's VC has many dark moments that are just tinged with sadness and feelings of longing. The fact that Elgar goes through these emotional episodes in such a quick succession reveals more to me than one that stays in one general frame of mind

You chose the VC in this poll. So I assume you like what Elgar does with the emotional extremes. And yet you're bothered when Mahler does it?

I don't understand [Mahler's] insistent need to stretch a listener back and forth to two totally different emotional extremes

Not meaning to bash you, John. Just trying to understand your reasoning.

Sarge

[Mirror Image]

You chose the VC in this poll. So I assume you like what Elgar does with the emotional extremes. And yet you're bothered when Mahler does it?

Not meaning to bash you, John. Just trying to understand your reasoning.

Sarge

I know you're not meaning to bash me, Sarge. I do plenty of that on my own without anyone's help...haha. Anyway, yes, I do like Elgar's emotional extremes because they don't feel like they're forced if this makes any sense? I always get the feeling that Mahler is trying too hard to make these emotional extremes clash whereas with Elgar they're simply a part of the music and flow with the greatest of ease. But this is just what I hear and couldn't possibly explain any further.

[Sergeant Rock]

I know you're not meaning to bash me, Sarge. I do plenty of that on my own without anyone's help...haha.

Anyway, yes, I do like Elgar's emotional extremes because they don't feel like they're forced if this makes any sense? I always get the feeling that Mahler is trying too hard to make these emotional extremes clash whereas with Elgar they're simply a part of the music and flow with the greatest of ease. But this is just what I hear and couldn't possibly explain any further.

Okay. I understand it's sometimes difficult to explain why something doesn't work for us on a personal level.

Sarge

[Mirror Image]

Okay. I understand it's sometimes difficult to explain why something doesn't work for us on a personal level.

Sarge

Indeed...

Bartok...the Quartets and Bluebeard. Why? I really don't know.

Sarge

[mc ukrneal]

The popularity of either work really has nothing to do with how it's perceived from listener to listener. I also don't agree with your analysis on the Violin Concerto. The Violin Concerto is a highly complex emotional work and I don't feel it's a 'brighter, happier world' than the Cello Concerto at all. I think there's a general misconception about the cello. Also, just because the cello has a darker tone, doesn't mean that the work that it's written for is going to project a darker sound-world. Elgar's VC has many dark moments that are just tinged with sadness and feelings of longing. The fact that Elgar goes through these emotional episodes in such a quick succession reveals more to me than one that stays in one general frame of mind (i. e. the Cello Concerto), but the CC isn't without it's complexities of course, it's just the VC's highly emotional sound-world requires more than a snap judgement.

Well, I was using the example to show that, layered or not, it was accessible immediately upon its release (I am under the impression that some think it more difficult). And a darker tone lends itself to a darker sound world. While I don't think of the violin concerto in this way, I certainly do the cello concerto.

I am not following your reference to revealing emotional episodes in quick succession. I would not equate this to complexity if that's what you are trying to do.

[mc ukrneal]

Just adding that I don't think many of us were talking about the reception in general, but much more personally. Certainly I wouldn't want to claim any more than that it took me personally much longer to get anywhere near to the bottom of the VC (compared with the CC). The difference in time scales very likely has more to do with my temperament than Elgar's music.

My impression, on the other thing, is that Beatrice Harrison's performances of the CC were generally rapturously received, though I haven't studied their relative receptions in any detail, so can't comment more than that. (Certainly I receive her recorded performance rapturously!!)

Just to say ... I don't hear it like this, myself - at least, not as an overall summary. To take the cadenza, for a moment ... that's as bleak as Elgar gets, I think - touching on the almost complete dissolution of hope. The bluff nobilmente section that takes over from it at the end reflects a kind of near-bravado, to my mind: 'enough of this introverted soul-searching ... let's get out and behave and confront the world and tweak our moustache!' So the nobilmente acts as a kind of foil to the harrowing introspection - I like to think of it as the 'public' elgar, while the windflowery stuff is very much the inner Elgar, longing for things he can't have. When it hits bottom, I find the VC reaches states that are even more painful than the CC reaches.

Of course I could just be telling myself stories. But it feels as if I get the stories from the music, and not the other way round.

See, I would not use the word 'bleak' to describe either one at any time in the piece. Introspective would be much closer to my own impression. I don't know if it helps, but I think of the violin concerto as being closer in nature to the first symphony, not the cello concerto.

[Elgarian]

See, I would not use the word 'bleak' to describe either one at any time in the piece. Introspective would be much closer to my own impression. I don't know if it helps, but I think of the violin concerto as being closer in nature to the first symphony, not the cello concerto.

This is why what we're dealing with is not a precise science, I guess! Ultimately music is music and feelings are feelings, and although the correlation between the two always sounds inevitable to us as individuals, there are these surprises when we find that for someone else the same music generates feelings completely different.

I guess the differences arise from the stories we tell ourselves (or perhaps don't tell ourselves). So the more I listened to the VC, and the more I read about Elgar and the Windflower, the more entwined the music became with what I was reading and thinking about. Now of course it's perfectly reasonable (perhaps even wiser) to listen to the music without any such associations as I make with it (though I'd say in my defence that I don't think Alice Stuart Wortley would or could have done, and Elgar certainly didn't compose it without them either). But still, but still - I come back again to that cadenza, and the placement of it - I mean, the way the concerto seems to be driving towards a conclusion when suddenly everything is brought to a halt, and the thrumming strings begin, omen-like, as a memory wafting in on the breeze. And here we are with the windflower themes once more, but now falteringly, on the violin alone, fragmentary, breaking up ... at time it seems as if the music can't continue, and maybe this time it really won't, and the music might fail, not for lack of inspiration, but for lack of will to continue ... and when at last he recovers himself and drives home to that blustery nobilmente conclusion which he doesn't quite believe in, he knows he's been in the pit, and has only just escaped.

Obviously there are all sorts of ways to approach the music, and I suppose over the years I may have become ossified in my interpretation to some degree. But it doesn't feel like ossification; it feels like living truth. I step into the VC and feel more alive, not less.

[71 dB]

...it feels like living truth.

Elgar's music in general feels to me like a living truth. I find Elgar's music "connected" to the reality, as if it has always existed, only Elgar was needed to reveal it to other people. The ways Elgar handles musical meanings are very sensitive and natural. These are some of the reason's why Elgar is my favorite composer.

[André]

I know you're not meaning to bash me, Sarge. I do plenty of that on my own without anyone's help...haha. Anyway, yes, I do like Elgar's emotional extremes because they don't feel like they're forced if this makes any sense? I always get the feeling that Mahler is trying too hard to make these emotional extremes clash whereas with Elgar they're simply a part of the music and flow with the greatest of ease . But this is just what I hear and couldn't possibly explain any further.

I recall reading in Time Magazine a paper about the forthcoming oscar night, version 1993. The author (Corliss ?) was weighing the pros and cons of each major nomination. Regarding Anthony Hopkin's chances for his roles in  Remains of the Day he wrote "Pro: could play a repressed Englishman in his sleep". Then "Con: coud play a repressed Englishman in his sleep"

I guess when it comes to Elgar it's exactly as MI puts it: emotional extremes in Elgar's music are a part of the fabric and cannot be pointed out via a theme, gesture or musical figure of style.

That's why we love our Elgar, don't we ?