Elgar's Hillside

[Elgarian]

That Monteux was my first Enigma!! Haven't played it in years.

Ha! Watch it Brian, I'm only 50 years behind you, and catching up fast!

Anyway, this has triggered a wonderful new interest in Enigma - how revitalising these chance discoveries can be. So I've picked up a few more - Paul Daniel with the LPO, William Boughton with the ESO - and that Solti version that recently came out on DVD. Must say, I didn't enjoy the Solti, who doesn't (for me) convey the warmth of friendship that lies at the heart of the piece. He gives a dramatic reading, full of contrasts, but his interpretations sometimes don't seem recognisable as affectionate musical comments on Elgar's chums. He makes Winifred Norbury sound like a cackling witch, for instance - someone I'd hope to avoid, rather than feel fondness for! Of course, musically there's no reason why he shouldn't do that; but it's not what I'm in search of.

Boughton's readings, too, are a bit odd when it comes to the delicate variations like W.N. and Dorabella (who comes over as a bit vacuous and silly, rather than adorably butterfly-like). However, Boughton generates some fabulous rumbustuousness in the more vigorous variations. Not a first recommendation, but good fun.

Daniel is still in the melting pot.

[Elgarian]

We just spent a week fulfilling an old ambition of mine - taking our bikes to the Malvern area and cycling some of the routes that Elgar used to ride with friends like Rosa Burley, Dora Penny, etc. The weather was mostly grim and we had two really thorough drenchings, but there were some good bits too. Thought I'd post a few photos taken en route.



My bike




At the time Elgar was writing Gerontius, he'd rented a cottage at Birchwood, just north-west of the hills. One hot summer day Dora Penny rode the 40 miles from Wolverhampton to visit, on her bike. She arrived to find Alice Elgar sitting in the garden listening to Elgar playing newly-composed sections of Gerontius indoors on the piano, the music wafting through the open window. Dora put her bike against a tree, said nothing, but just sat with Alice and listened. This was the view in front of them that afternoon, from that garden.




The land west of the hills (1)




The land west of the hills (2)




From south of the British Camp

[Karl Henning]

Lovely, Alan, thanks. And good to "see" you!

[DavidRoss]

I put on Monteaux's Enigma Variations and returned to this thread only to find your lovely photos of that beautiful countryside, Alan. Per the current fashion in these parts, +1 to Karl's post.

[Elgarian]

Well, I make no secret of the fact that I'm a haunted man. These landscapes, and this man's music, tug at me like no other.

Before we embarked on our travels, I took my copy of the 1897 Ordnance Survey Map to the Elgar Birthplace museum, where they have his cycling maps on display. I spent an hour copying Elgar's red lines - the results of years of cycling expeditions - onto my map, so we could follow quite specifically in his cycle tracks, when we wanted to. Here's a scan of part of my copy. The Malvern Hills run North/South, long and narrow, just left of centre. It's clear to see from this that Elgar rode around the hills, but not over them (wise man).

[madaboutmahler]

Must say, I didn't enjoy the Solti, who doesn't (for me) convey the warmth of friendship that lies at the heart of the piece. He gives a dramatic reading, full of contrasts, but his interpretations sometimes don't seem recognisable as affectionate musical comments on Elgar's chums. He makes Winifred Norbury sound like a cackling witch, for instance - someone I'd hope to avoid, rather than feel fondness for! Of course, musically there's no reason why he shouldn't do that; but it's not what I'm in search of.

Thank you for posting all this feedback on these recordings of the Enigma, Alan. Very interesting and helpful to read. So about Solti, what do you think about his recordings of the symphonies? And his other recordings of the Elgar orchestral works as well?

Really wonderful pictures too by the way, Alan!

[Elgarian]

So about Solti, what do you think about his recordings of the symphonies? And his other recordings of the Elgar orchestral works as well?

Funny thing. Although I can't get enough of Solti's Wagner, I've never been tempted (until now, with Enigma) to sample his Elgar. Not because I disapprove, in some way - he's a tremendously exciting conductor - but because I always had a suspicion that his approach to Elgar would rub me up the wrong way. That suspicion was confirmed by the Enigma performance I watched recently, and I now feel a bit uncomfortable about tackling the 2nd symphony that's on the same DVD. One day I'll take the plunge, but I'm not in a rush.

I should add that these are personal and essentially non-rational misgivings and I'm not attempting to argue with those who admire his Elgar.

[Lisztianwagner]

We just spent a week fulfilling an old ambition of mine - taking our bikes to the Malvern area and cycling some of the routes that Elgar used to ride with friends like Rosa Burley, Dora Penny, etc. The weather was mostly grim and we had two really thorough drenchings, but there were some good bits too. Thought I'd post a few photos taken en route.



My bike




At the time Elgar was writing Gerontius, he'd rented a cottage at Birchwood, just north-west of the hills. One hot summer day Dora Penny rode the 40 miles from Wolverhampton to visit, on her bike. She arrived to find Alice Elgar sitting in the garden listening to Elgar playing newly-composed sections of Gerontius indoors on the piano, the music wafting through the open window. Dora put her bike against a tree, said nothing, but just sat with Alice and listened. This was the view in front of them that afternoon, from that garden.




The land west of the hills (1)




The land west of the hills (2)




From south of the British Camp

Wow, I can easily understand why Elgar was so inspired by this landscape, it is absolutely enchanting.

[Elgarian]

A few more Elgarian photos 'from the saddle' (Chanson de Nuit sort of mood):

[mc ukrneal]

A few more Elgarian photos 'from the saddle' (Chanson de Nuit sort of mood):

Perfect piture. Very evocative. I can hear the music in my head by just looking at this picture.

[Archaic Torso of Apollo]

about Solti, what do you think about his recordings of the symphonies?

For my part, I like them. The story goes that Solti studied Elgar's own recordings, and tried to reproduce his fast tempi. The results are exciting, though if you like your Elgar more atmospheric or relaxed, you might not like them so much.

Since Enigma is the topic here: the last concert I attended in Moscow was an all-Elgar program conducted by Rozhdestvensky, with Enigma as the second half. Done in a very peculiar way, though: Rozhdestvensky broke the whole thing up by playing each variation separately, prefacing it by reading Elgar's description of the particular friend it was supposed to depict. The orchestra coped with this stop-and-go very well; but I think this is the sort of thing I only want to hear once in a lifetime.

[Scarpia]

Looks like Pennsylvania.

A few more Elgarian photos 'from the saddle' (Chanson de Nuit sort of mood):

[madaboutmahler]

Funny thing. Although I can't get enough of Solti's Wagner, I've never been tempted (until now, with Enigma) to sample his Elgar. Not because I disapprove, in some way - he's a tremendously exciting conductor - but because I always had a suspicion that his approach to Elgar would rub me up the wrong way. That suspicion was confirmed by the Enigma performance I watched recently, and I now feel a bit uncomfortable about tackling the 2nd symphony that's on the same DVD. One day I'll take the plunge, but I'm not in a rush.

I should add that these are personal and essentially non-rational misgivings and I'm not attempting to argue with those who admire his Elgar.

Interesting, Alan. Solti's Decca Elgar recordings are some of my favourites, I love the energy in the performances. It's great that Solti, being a non-British conductor of course, became such a champion of Elgar. I have not heard the DVD performances you talk about, Alan.... I assume they are different performances from the Decca recording?

And all those photos are so beautiful, thank you for uploading!

[kishnevi]

Lovely, Alan, thanks. And good to "see" you!

+1
BTW, thank you for posting about the Aberlour way back when.  I got a bottle and it's very much as good as you said it was.  I'm even thinking of putting down the money to give a bottle to my rabbi;  he's fixated on Glenlivet, and needs to be trained for something better.

(This has nothing to do with Elgar, of course, except that we can imagine Elgar would have enjoyed the Aberlour as much as Alan and I do.)

[Elgarian]

+1
BTW, thank you for posting about the Aberlour way back when.  I got a bottle and it's very much as good as you said it was.  I'm even thinking of putting down the money to give a bottle to my rabbi;  he's fixated on Glenlivet, and needs to be trained for something better.

(This has nothing to do with Elgar, of course, except that we can imagine Elgar would have enjoyed the Aberlour as much as Alan and I do.)

Oh that's marvellous - I'm so glad you liked it Jeffrey. Cheers! As I write that, I realise that 'liking' Aberlour A'bunadh seems an inadequate expression - I should have said 'I'm glad you're enjoying the journeys it takes you on', shouldn't I? If Glenlivet is a pleasant bus ride down to the chemist, A'bunadh is a trip on the Orient Express. Whenever my daughter comes to stay and I offer her a malt and ask 'which one?', she goes all shifty-looking and guilty, until I say 'It's OK, you can have that', and she brightens immediately, all problems of choice suddenly solved.

And to keep us on topic, I have to confess that I have no idea whether Elgar ever sampled the stuff; but I bet he'd have loved it if he did.

[Karl Henning]

A few more Elgarian photos 'from the saddle' (Chanson de Nuit sort of mood):

But not "Blues in the Night"

[Elgarian]

Interesting, Alan. Solti's Decca Elgar recordings are some of my favourites, I love the energy in the performances. It's great that Solti, being a non-British conductor of course, became such a champion of Elgar. I have not heard the DVD performances you talk about, Alan.... I assume they are different performances from the Decca recording?

I don't know, Daniel - I don't have Solti's Elgar on CD - I assume they're different?

And you're quite right - as someone pointed out earlier, Solti took great pains to listen to Elgar's own recordings, so his approach can hardly be faulted on that account. No, this is very much an idiosyncrasy of my own. But this is complicated territory - Elgar's recordings of his own works aren't usually my favourites. They're absolutely fascinating, and they raise all sorts of goosebumps because it's him, and I would never want to be without them; but his own Enigma recording is nowhere near so effective - for me - as Monteux's.

[CriticalI]

And you're quite right - as someone pointed out earlier, Solti took great pains to listen to Elgar's own recordings, so his approach can hardly be faulted on that account. No, this is very much an idiosyncrasy of my own.

No, I think this is one of those myths that gets built up by vague recollection and hearsay. I went through the archives of Gramophone (which oldtimers in another forum suggested was the source of the story) and found no direct evidence. The source of the story seems to be an article on Solti's recording, published before the record was released, in the April 1972 issue (follow link and click page 6). I have bolded the only passage which might be taken as evidence for Solti studying Elgar (sorry about the OCR errors):

SIR GEORGE'S ELGAR
Edward Greenfield writes: "It's beautiful, beautiful!" says George Solti, purring with joy. In the playback of the latest take of Elgar's First Symphony, we have reached the most magic moment of all, the arrival of the hushed third theme in the slow movement. This is Solti's first recording with the London Philharmonic Orchestra for many years, his firstever recording of Elgar, and—very aptly—his first recording since becoming a British citizen, now officially Sir George Sold.
It is some years now since Sold told me of his ambition to conduct this symphony, and I suggested at once that he should hear the composer's own recording which so passionately develops on what is contained in the score. Since then World Record Club has reissued that historic recording on LP, and Sold has taken advantage of that. This was plain enough in the Festival Hall performance which preceded these Kingwsay Hall recording sessions for Decca, but at the session he insists on fresh rehearsal in much more detail than is common in recordings after live performances. In the care with which he analyses the phrasing of the slow movement, one begins to appreciate how his Mahler style has been built up, how his Elgar style is developing.
I arrive at the second of the three sessions. The first, the previous day, was bedevilled with power-cuts. It had to be fitted in between noon and 3 pm over what is normally the lunchbreak, but the power engineers in the generating station had given a warning of the impending cut at 3 pm. They made a preliminary cut of only a second, but it was more than enough to ruin the important long take, which—using every minute promised— was just reaching its climax. It was impossible to recapture the right spirit before the full power cut came. In any case Solti was disappointed with results, worrying over precise details of the sound.
The power cut meant that the first movement was not quite completed, but at the second session Sold decided to press on with the second and third movements recorded together. He did a complete take, nearly 20 minutes long with the slow movement substantially more relaxed than it had been in the Festival Hall. He heard the playback, and then spent no less than half an hour analysing. There then came the master take of those two movements, of which the LPO leader, Rodney Friend, said that he had never previously in his experience known so perfect a take of such a length. At the playback Friend sat alert, waiting in particular for the sequence of pianissimo entries for the strings on each theme. At each his face lit up. As he said, for the final fleeting reference to the third theme, he and his violin colleagues had hardly dared put their bows on the strings, and the resulting intensity conveyed that.
Sold himself, plainly enjoying the playback, was still keenly analytical, testing the tempo momentarily with a pocket metronome during the scherzo. He did one retake of the opening of the scherzo, and that was all. He wanted to leave time for another take of the first movement. For 15 minutes he did more analysis, and then did a take as far as the recapitulation. He restarted just before that point, but by now there was not quite time enough to complete the movement. He reached the relaxation of the coda, and waved to the players that they were now free. Thus far in the first movement too this performance was providing the master take—some achievement getting so much done in a single session.

The subsequent review in the August 1972 issue says "Edward Greenfield contributed a fascinating piece about the sessions which resulted in this new version. And at the basis of Solti's interpretation, he makes clear, is Elgar's own recording" - but the reviewer then goes on to talk mostly about how Solti's performance differs from Elgar's.

[Archaic Torso of Apollo]

No, I think this is one of those myths that gets built up by vague recollection and hearsay.

Well the article does support the claim, so I don't see how you came to that conclusion. We learn that Solti, who for some strange reason is referred to as "Sold" in the article, listened to Elgar's performance and (by implication) was influenced by it.

As for this:

but the reviewer then goes on to talk mostly about how Solti's performance differs from Elgar's.

I don't find it unusual; what conductor would want merely to produce a copycat version of an earlier performance?

[Karl Henning]

Exactly. The fact that his interpretation is different, does not mean that he did not consult the document.