Symphony No. 1 (Elgar)
Encyclopedia
Sir Edward Elgar
's Symphony No. 1 in A-flat major, Op. 55 is one of his two completed symphonies. The first performance was given by the Hallé Orchestra
conducted by Hans Richter
in Manchester
, England, on 3 December 1908. It was widely known that Elgar had been planning a symphony for more than ten years, and the announcement that he had finally completed it aroused enormous interest. The critical reception was enthusiastic, and the public response unprecedented. The symphony achieved what The Musical Times
described as "immediate and phenomenal success", with a hundred performances in Britain, continental Europe and America within just over a year of its première.
The symphony is regularly programmed by British orchestras, and features occasionally in concert programmes in North America and Europe. It is well represented on record, with recordings ranging from the composer's 1931 version with the London Symphony Orchestra
to modern digital recordings, of which more than 20 have been issued since the mid 1980s.
rather as Beethoven
's Eroica
was originally intended to celebrate a hero. In 1899 he wrote to his friend A. J. Jaeger
(the "Nimrod" of the Enigma Variations
), "Now as to Gordon: the thing possesses me, but I can't write it down yet." After he completed his oratorio The Kingdom
in 1906 Elgar had a brief fallow period. As he passed his fiftieth birthday he turned to his boyhood compositions which he reshaped into The Wand of Youth suites during the summer of 1907. He began work on a symphony and when he went to Rome for the winter he continued work on it, finishing the first movement. After his return to England he worked on the rest of the symphony during the summer of 1908.
Elgar had abandoned the idea of a "Gordon" symphony, in favour of a wholly unprogrammatic work. He had come to consider abstract music as the pinnacle of orchestral composition. In 1905 he gave a lecture on the Third Symphony of Brahms
, in which he said that when music was simply a description of something else it was carrying a large art somewhat further than he cared for. He thought music, as a simple art, was at its best when it was simple, without description, as in the case of the Brahms symphony. The first page of the manuscript carries the title, "Symphony for Full Orchestra, Op. 55." To the music critic Ernest Newman
he wrote that the new symphony was nothing to do with Gordon, and to the composer Walford Davies he wrote, "There is no programme beyond a wide experience of human life with a great charity (love) and a massive hope in the future."
The symphony was dedicated "To Hans Richter, Mus. Doc. True Artist and true Friend." It was premiered on 3 December 1908 in the Free Trade Hall
in Manchester
, with Richter conducting the Hallé Orchestra. The London première followed four days later, at the Queen's Hall
, with the London Symphony Orchestra
conducted by Richter. At the first rehearsal for the London concert, Richter addressed the orchestra, "Gentlemen, let us now rehearse the greatest symphony of modern times, written by the greatest modern composer – and not only in this country." W H Reed
, who played in the LSO at that concert, recalled, "Arriving at the Adagio, [Richter] spoke almost with the sound of tears in his voice and said: 'Ah! this is a real Adagio – such an Adagio as Beethove' would 'ave writ'."
The Musical Times
wrote in 1909, "To state that Elgar's Symphony has achieved immediate and phenomenal success is the bare truth." Within weeks of the première the symphony was performed in New York under Walter Damrosch, Vienna under Ferdinand Löwe
, St. Petersburg under Alexander Siloti
, and Leipzig under Artur Nikisch. There were performances in Chicago
, Boston
, Toronto
and 15 British towns and cities. By February 1909 the New York Philharmonic Orchestra had given two more performances at Carnegie Hall
and had taken the work to "some of the largest inland cities … It is doubtful whether any symphonic work has aroused so great an interest since Tchaikowsky
's Pathétique
." In the same period the work was played six times in London, under the baton of Richter, the composer, and Henry Wood. Within just over a year there were a hundred performances worldwide.
The Musical Times printed a digest of press comments on the symphony. The Daily Telegraph
was quoted as saying, "[T]hematic beauty is abundant. It is exquisite in the adagio, and in the first and second allegros, the latter a kind of scherzo; when the rhythmic impulse, the power and the passion are at their extreme height, when the music becomes almost frenzied in its superb energy, the sense of sheer beauty is still strong." The Morning Post, wrote, "This is a work for the future, and will stand as a legacy for coming generations; in it are the loftiness and nobility that indicate a masterpiece, though its full appreciation will only be from the most serious-minded; to-day we recognise it as a possession of which to be proud." The Evening Standard said, Here we have the true Elgar – strong, tender, simple, with a simplicity bred of inevitable expression. … The composer has written a work of rare beauty, sensibility, and humanity, a work understandable of all."
The Musical Times refrained from quoting The Observer
, which was the only dissenting voice among the main newspapers. It complained that the work was derivative of Mendelssohn
, Brahms
and Wagner
, and thought the theme of the slow movement "cheap ready-made material". It allowed, however, that "Elgar's orchestration is so magnificently modern that the dress disguises the skeleton." This adverse view was in contrast with the praise in The Times
: "[A] great work of art, which is lofty in conception and sincere in expression, and which must stand as a landmark in the development of the younger school of English music." In The Manchester Guardian
, Samuel Langford
described the work as "sublime … the work is the noblest ever penned for instruments by an English composer."
The Times noted the influence of Wagner and Brahms: "There are characteristic reminiscences of Parsifal … and rhythmically the chief theme looks like an offspring of Brahms" but concluded "it is not only an original work, but one of the most original and most important that has been added to the stock of recent music." The New York Times
, which also detected the influence of Parsifal, and, in the finale, of Verdi
's Aida
, called the symphony "a work of such importance that conductors will not lightly let it drop."
It is scored for three flute
s (one doubling piccolo
), two oboe
s and cor anglais, two clarinet
s and bass clarinet
, two bassoon
s and contrabassoon
, four horn
s, three trumpet
s, three trombone
s, tuba
, timpani
, percussion
(including snare drum
, bass drum
and cymbal
s), 2 harp
s, and string
s. It is in four movements:
The symphony is in a cyclic form
: the incomplete "nobilmente" theme from the first movement returns in the finale for a complete grandioso statement after various transformations throughout the work. Elgar wrote, "the opening theme is intended to be simple &, in intention, noble & elevating ... the sort of ideal call – in the sense of persuasion, not coercion or command – & something above every day & sordid things." The musicologist Michael Kennedy
writes "One cannot call it a motto-theme, but it is an idée fixe, and after its first quiet statement, the full orchestra repeat it fortissimo. It gently subsides back to woodwind and violas and abruptly switches to D minor, an extraordinary choice of key for the first allegro of a Symphony in A flat." Reed speculates that Elgar's choice of D minor was a gesture against academic rules. According to the conductor Sir Adrian Boult
, the clashing keys arose because someone made a bet with Elgar that he could not compose a symphony in two keys at once. The movement is in traditional sonata form
with two main themes, a development and a recapitulation. It ends quietly, "an effect of magical stillness".
The second movement is a brisk allegro. Elgar did not call it a scherzo
, and though Reed calls it "vivacious", others, including Kennedy, have found it restless and even sinister in parts. A middle section, in B flat, is in Elgar's Wand of Youth vein. He asked orchestras to play it "like something you hear down by the river." As the movement draws to a close it slows down, and its first theme is transformed into the main theme of the slow movement, despite their contrasting tempi and different keys. According to Reed, "Someone once had the temerity to ask Elgar which version, the allegro or the adagio, was written first; but the question was not very well received and the subject was not pursued."
Kennedy says of the adagio that it is "unique among Elgar slow movements in the absence of that anguished yearning usually to be found in his quieter passages. There is no Angst here, instead a benedictory tranquillity..." The second subject of the movement remains in the tranquil vein, and the movement ends in what Reed calls "the astounding effect of the muted trombones in the last five bars … like a voice from another world."
The finale begins in D minor with a slow repeat of one of the subsidiary themes of the first movement, showing Elgar in "one of his most dreamy and mysterious moods." After the introduction there is a restless allegro, with a succession of themes including an "impulsive march-rhythm". The movement builds to a climax and ends with the nobilmente opening theme of the symphony returning "orchestrated with glittering splendour" to bring the work to a "triumphant and confident" conclusion.
's archives show that in a 1930 broadcast performance Elgar took 46 minutes. Elgar was noted for his brisk tempi in his own music, and later performances have been slower. Elgar's contemporaries, Sir Henry Wood and Sir Hamilton Harty
took respectively 50:15 (1930) and 59:45 in 1940. In 1972, while preparing a new recording, Georg Solti
studied Elgar's 1931 performance. Solti's fast tempi, based on the composer's own, came as a shock to Elgarians accustomed to the broader tempi taken by Harty, Sir John Barbirolli
and others in the mid-20th century. Barbirolli's 1963 recording takes 53:53; Solti takes 48:48. Later examples of slower tempi include a 1992 recording conducted by Giuseppe Sinopoli
(55:18), and a 2001 live recording conducted by Sir Colin Davis
(54:47).
in 1931, conducted by the composer for His Master's Voice. The recording was reissued on long-playing record (LP
) in 1970, and on compact disc in 1992 as part of EMI
's "Elgar Edition" of all the composer's electrical recordings of his works.
After 1931 the work received no further gramophone recordings until Sir Adrian Boult
's 1950 recording. During the 1950s there was only one other new recording of the symphony, and in the 1960s there were only two. In the 1970s there were four new recordings. In the 1980s there were six, and the 1990s saw twelve. Ten new recordings were released in the first decade of the 21st century. Most of the recordings have been by British orchestras and conductors, but exceptions include the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra
, Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra
, Dresden Staatskapelle, and Sydney Symphony Orchestra
, and conductors Vladimir Ashkenazy
, Daniel Barenboim
, Bernard Haitink
, Tadaaki Otaka
, André Previn
, Constantin Silvestri
, Giuseppe Sinopoli, and Leonard Slatkin
.
BBC
Radio 3
's "Building a Library" feature, a comparative review of all available recordings, has considered the symphony three times since 1982. The Penguin Guide to Recorded Classical Music
, 2008 edition, contains two pages of reviews of the work. The two recordings recommended by both the BBC and The Penguin Guide are by Boult and the London Philharmonic Orchestra (1977) and Vernon Handley
with the same orchestra (1979).
Edward Elgar
Sir Edward William Elgar, 1st Baronet OM, GCVO was an English composer, many of whose works have entered the British and international classical concert repertoire. Among his best-known compositions are orchestral works including the Enigma Variations, the Pomp and Circumstance Marches, concertos...
's Symphony No. 1 in A-flat major, Op. 55 is one of his two completed symphonies. The first performance was given by the Hallé Orchestra
The Hallé
The Hallé is a symphony orchestra based in Manchester, England. It is the UK's oldest extant symphony orchestra , supports a choir, youth choir and a youth orchestra, and releases its recordings on its own record label, though it has occasionally released recordings on Angel Records and EMI...
conducted by Hans Richter
Hans Richter (conductor)
Hans Richter was an Austrian orchestral and operatic conductor.-Biography:Richter was born in Raab , Kingdom of Hungary, Austro-Hungarian Empire. His mother was opera-singer Jozsefa Csazenszky. He studied at the Vienna Conservatory...
in Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
, England, on 3 December 1908. It was widely known that Elgar had been planning a symphony for more than ten years, and the announcement that he had finally completed it aroused enormous interest. The critical reception was enthusiastic, and the public response unprecedented. The symphony achieved what The Musical Times
The Musical Times
The Musical Times is an academic journal of classical music edited and produced in the United Kingdom. It is currently the oldest such journal that is still publishing in the UK, having been published continuously since 1844. It was published as The Musical Times and Singing Class Circular until...
described as "immediate and phenomenal success", with a hundred performances in Britain, continental Europe and America within just over a year of its première.
The symphony is regularly programmed by British orchestras, and features occasionally in concert programmes in North America and Europe. It is well represented on record, with recordings ranging from the composer's 1931 version with the London Symphony Orchestra
London Symphony Orchestra
The London Symphony Orchestra is a major orchestra of the United Kingdom, as well as one of the best-known orchestras in the world. Since 1982, the LSO has been based in London's Barbican Centre.-History:...
to modern digital recordings, of which more than 20 have been issued since the mid 1980s.
Composition and première
Nearly ten years before composing the Symphony No 1, Elgar had been obsessed with the idea of writing a symphony to commemorate General Charles George GordonCharles George Gordon
Major-General Charles George Gordon, CB , known as "Chinese" Gordon, Gordon Pasha, and Gordon of Khartoum, was a British army officer and administrator....
rather as Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential composers of all time.Born in Bonn, then the capital of the Electorate of Cologne and part of...
's Eroica
Symphony No. 3 (Beethoven)
Ludwig van Beethoven's Symphony No. 3 in E flat major , also known as the Eroica , is a landmark musical work marking the full arrival of the composer's "middle-period," a series of unprecedented large scale works of emotional depth and structural rigor.The symphony is widely regarded as a mature...
was originally intended to celebrate a hero. In 1899 he wrote to his friend A. J. Jaeger
August Jaeger
August Jaeger was an Anglo-German music publisher, who developed a close friendship with the English composer Edward Elgar.Born in Düsseldorf, Germany, Jaeger met Elgar through his employment at the London music publisher Novello...
(the "Nimrod" of the Enigma Variations
Enigma Variations
Variations on an Original Theme for orchestra , Op. 36, commonly referred to as the Enigma Variations, is a set of a theme and its fourteen variations written for orchestra by Edward Elgar in 1898–1899. It is Elgar's best-known large-scale composition, for both the music itself and the...
), "Now as to Gordon: the thing possesses me, but I can't write it down yet." After he completed his oratorio The Kingdom
The Kingdom (Elgar)
The Kingdom, Op. 51, is an oratorio for soloists, chorus and orchestra composed by Edward Elgar.It was first performed at the Birmingham Music Festival on 3 October 1906, with the orchestra conducted by the composer, and soloists Agnes Nicholls, Muriel Foster, John Coates and William Higley. The...
in 1906 Elgar had a brief fallow period. As he passed his fiftieth birthday he turned to his boyhood compositions which he reshaped into The Wand of Youth suites during the summer of 1907. He began work on a symphony and when he went to Rome for the winter he continued work on it, finishing the first movement. After his return to England he worked on the rest of the symphony during the summer of 1908.
Elgar had abandoned the idea of a "Gordon" symphony, in favour of a wholly unprogrammatic work. He had come to consider abstract music as the pinnacle of orchestral composition. In 1905 he gave a lecture on the Third Symphony of Brahms
Symphony No. 3 (Brahms)
The Symphony No. 3 in F major, Op. 90, is a symphony written by Johannes Brahms. The work was written in the summer of 1883 at Wiesbaden, nearly six years after he completed his Second Symphony...
, in which he said that when music was simply a description of something else it was carrying a large art somewhat further than he cared for. He thought music, as a simple art, was at its best when it was simple, without description, as in the case of the Brahms symphony. The first page of the manuscript carries the title, "Symphony for Full Orchestra, Op. 55." To the music critic Ernest Newman
Ernest Newman
Ernest Newman was an English music critic and musicologist. Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians describes him as "the most celebrated British music critic in the first half of the 20th century." His style of criticism, aiming at intellectual objectivity in contrast to the more subjective...
he wrote that the new symphony was nothing to do with Gordon, and to the composer Walford Davies he wrote, "There is no programme beyond a wide experience of human life with a great charity (love) and a massive hope in the future."
Free Trade Hall
The Free Trade Hall, Peter Street, Manchester, was a public hall constructed in 1853–6 on St Peter's Fields, the site of the Peterloo Massacre and is now a hotel. The hall was built to commemorate the repeal of the Corn Laws in 1846. The architect was Edward Walters The hall subsequently was...
in Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
, with Richter conducting the Hallé Orchestra. The London première followed four days later, at the Queen's Hall
Queen's Hall
The Queen's Hall was a concert hall in Langham Place, London, opened in 1893. Designed by the architect T.E. Knightley, it had room for an audience of about 2,500 people. It became London's principal concert venue. From 1895 until 1941, it was the home of the promenade concerts founded by Robert...
, with the London Symphony Orchestra
London Symphony Orchestra
The London Symphony Orchestra is a major orchestra of the United Kingdom, as well as one of the best-known orchestras in the world. Since 1982, the LSO has been based in London's Barbican Centre.-History:...
conducted by Richter. At the first rehearsal for the London concert, Richter addressed the orchestra, "Gentlemen, let us now rehearse the greatest symphony of modern times, written by the greatest modern composer – and not only in this country." W H Reed
William Henry Reed
William Henry "Billy" Reed was an English violinist, teacher, minor composer, conductor and biographer of Sir Edward Elgar...
, who played in the LSO at that concert, recalled, "Arriving at the Adagio, [Richter] spoke almost with the sound of tears in his voice and said: 'Ah! this is a real Adagio – such an Adagio as Beethove' would 'ave writ'."
The Musical Times
The Musical Times
The Musical Times is an academic journal of classical music edited and produced in the United Kingdom. It is currently the oldest such journal that is still publishing in the UK, having been published continuously since 1844. It was published as The Musical Times and Singing Class Circular until...
wrote in 1909, "To state that Elgar's Symphony has achieved immediate and phenomenal success is the bare truth." Within weeks of the première the symphony was performed in New York under Walter Damrosch, Vienna under Ferdinand Löwe
Ferdinand Löwe
Ferdinand Löwe was an Austrian conductor.- Biography :Löwe was born in Vienna, Austria where along with Munich, Germany his career was primarily centered. From 1896 Löwe conducted the Kaim Orchestra, today's Munich Philharmonic, where he returned from 1908 to 1914...
, St. Petersburg under Alexander Siloti
Alexander Siloti
Alexander Ilyich Siloti was a Russian pianist, conductor and composer. Alexander Ilyich Siloti (also Ziloti, , Aleksandr Iljič Ziloti) (9 October 1863, near Kharkiv - 8 December 1945, New York) was a Russian pianist, conductor and composer. Alexander Ilyich Siloti (also Ziloti, , Aleksandr Iljič...
, and Leipzig under Artur Nikisch. There were performances in Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
, Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
, Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
and 15 British towns and cities. By February 1909 the New York Philharmonic Orchestra had given two more performances at Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States, located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east stretch of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street and West 57th Street, two blocks south of Central Park....
and had taken the work to "some of the largest inland cities … It is doubtful whether any symphonic work has aroused so great an interest since Tchaikowsky
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (Russian: Пётр Ильи́ч Чайко́вский ; often "Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky" in English. His names are also transliterated "Piotr" or "Petr"; "Ilitsch", "Il'ich" or "Illyich"; and "Tschaikowski", "Tschaikowsky", "Chajkovskij"...
's Pathétique
Symphony No. 6 (Tchaikovsky)
The Symphony No. 6 in B minor, Op. 74, Pathétique is Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's final completed symphony, written between February and the end of August 1893. The composer led the first performance in Saint Petersburg on 16/28 October of that year, nine days before his death...
." In the same period the work was played six times in London, under the baton of Richter, the composer, and Henry Wood. Within just over a year there were a hundred performances worldwide.
The Musical Times printed a digest of press comments on the symphony. The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
was quoted as saying, "[T]hematic beauty is abundant. It is exquisite in the adagio, and in the first and second allegros, the latter a kind of scherzo; when the rhythmic impulse, the power and the passion are at their extreme height, when the music becomes almost frenzied in its superb energy, the sense of sheer beauty is still strong." The Morning Post, wrote, "This is a work for the future, and will stand as a legacy for coming generations; in it are the loftiness and nobility that indicate a masterpiece, though its full appreciation will only be from the most serious-minded; to-day we recognise it as a possession of which to be proud." The Evening Standard said, Here we have the true Elgar – strong, tender, simple, with a simplicity bred of inevitable expression. … The composer has written a work of rare beauty, sensibility, and humanity, a work understandable of all."
The Musical Times refrained from quoting The Observer
The Observer
The Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...
, which was the only dissenting voice among the main newspapers. It complained that the work was derivative of Mendelssohn
Felix Mendelssohn
Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Barthóldy , use the form 'Mendelssohn' and not 'Mendelssohn Bartholdy'. The Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians gives ' Felix Mendelssohn' as the entry, with 'Mendelssohn' used in the body text...
, Brahms
Johannes Brahms
Johannes Brahms was a German composer and pianist, and one of the leading musicians of the Romantic period. Born in Hamburg, Brahms spent much of his professional life in Vienna, Austria, where he was a leader of the musical scene...
and Wagner
Richard Wagner
Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...
, and thought the theme of the slow movement "cheap ready-made material". It allowed, however, that "Elgar's orchestration is so magnificently modern that the dress disguises the skeleton." This adverse view was in contrast with the praise in The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
: "[A] great work of art, which is lofty in conception and sincere in expression, and which must stand as a landmark in the development of the younger school of English music." In The Manchester Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, Samuel Langford
Samuel Langford
Samuel Langford was an influential English music critic of the early twentieth century.Trained as a pianist, Langford became chief music critic of The Manchester Guardian in 1906, serving in that post until his death...
described the work as "sublime … the work is the noblest ever penned for instruments by an English composer."
The Times noted the influence of Wagner and Brahms: "There are characteristic reminiscences of Parsifal … and rhythmically the chief theme looks like an offspring of Brahms" but concluded "it is not only an original work, but one of the most original and most important that has been added to the stock of recent music." The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, which also detected the influence of Parsifal, and, in the finale, of Verdi
Giuseppe Verdi
Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was an Italian Romantic composer, mainly of opera. He was one of the most influential composers of the 19th century...
's Aida
Aida
Aida sometimes spelled Aïda, is an opera in four acts by Giuseppe Verdi to an Italian libretto by Antonio Ghislanzoni, based on a scenario written by French Egyptologist Auguste Mariette...
, called the symphony "a work of such importance that conductors will not lightly let it drop."
Musical analysis
The work is the only frequently-performed symphony whose main key is A-flat major.It is scored for three flute
Flute
The flute is a musical instrument of the woodwind family. Unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is an aerophone or reedless wind instrument that produces its sound from the flow of air across an opening...
s (one doubling piccolo
Piccolo
The piccolo is a half-size flute, and a member of the woodwind family of musical instruments. The piccolo has the same fingerings as its larger sibling, the standard transverse flute, but the sound it produces is an octave higher than written...
), two oboe
Oboe
The oboe is a double reed musical instrument of the woodwind family. In English, prior to 1770, the instrument was called "hautbois" , "hoboy", or "French hoboy". The spelling "oboe" was adopted into English ca...
s and cor anglais, two clarinet
Clarinet
The clarinet is a musical instrument of woodwind type. The name derives from adding the suffix -et to the Italian word clarino , as the first clarinets had a strident tone similar to that of a trumpet. The instrument has an approximately cylindrical bore, and uses a single reed...
s and bass clarinet
Bass clarinet
The bass clarinet is a musical instrument of the clarinet family. Like the more common soprano B clarinet, it is usually pitched in B , but it plays notes an octave below the soprano B clarinet...
, two bassoon
Bassoon
The bassoon is a woodwind instrument in the double reed family that typically plays music written in the bass and tenor registers, and occasionally higher. Appearing in its modern form in the 19th century, the bassoon figures prominently in orchestral, concert band and chamber music literature...
s and contrabassoon
Contrabassoon
The contrabassoon, also known as the double bassoon or double-bassoon, is a larger version of the bassoon, sounding an octave lower...
, four horn
Horn (instrument)
The horn is a brass instrument consisting of about of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell. A musician who plays the horn is called a horn player ....
s, three trumpet
Trumpet
The trumpet is the musical instrument with the highest register in the brass family. Trumpets are among the oldest musical instruments, dating back to at least 1500 BCE. They are played by blowing air through closed lips, producing a "buzzing" sound which starts a standing wave vibration in the air...
s, three trombone
Trombone
The trombone is a musical instrument in the brass family. Like all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player’s vibrating lips cause the air column inside the instrument to vibrate...
s, tuba
Tuba
The tuba is the largest and lowest-pitched brass instrument. Sound is produced by vibrating or "buzzing" the lips into a large cupped mouthpiece. It is one of the most recent additions to the modern symphony orchestra, first appearing in the mid-19th century, when it largely replaced the...
, timpani
Timpani
Timpani, or kettledrums, are musical instruments in the percussion family. A type of drum, they consist of a skin called a head stretched over a large bowl traditionally made of copper. They are played by striking the head with a specialized drum stick called a timpani stick or timpani mallet...
, percussion
Percussion instrument
A percussion instrument is any object which produces a sound when hit with an implement or when it is shaken, rubbed, scraped, or otherwise acted upon in a way that sets the object into vibration...
(including snare drum
Snare drum
The snare drum or side drum is a melodic percussion instrument with strands of snares made of curled metal wire, metal cable, plastic cable, or gut cords stretched across the drumhead, typically the bottom. Pipe and tabor and some military snare drums often have a second set of snares on the bottom...
, bass drum
Bass drum
Bass drums are percussion instruments that can vary in size and are used in several musical genres. Three major types of bass drums can be distinguished. The type usually seen or heard in orchestral, ensemble or concert band music is the orchestral, or concert bass drum . It is the largest drum of...
and cymbal
Cymbal
Cymbals are a common percussion instrument. Cymbals consist of thin, normally round plates of various alloys; see cymbal making for a discussion of their manufacture. The greater majority of cymbals are of indefinite pitch, although small disc-shaped cymbals based on ancient designs sound a...
s), 2 harp
Harp
The harp is a multi-stringed instrument which has the plane of its strings positioned perpendicularly to the soundboard. Organologically, it is in the general category of chordophones and has its own sub category . All harps have a neck, resonator and strings...
s, and string
String instrument
A string instrument is a musical instrument that produces sound by means of vibrating strings. In the Hornbostel-Sachs scheme of musical instrument classification, used in organology, they are called chordophones...
s. It is in four movements:
- I. Andante. Nobilmente e semplice
- II. Allegro molto
- III. Adagio
- IV. Lento — Allegro
The symphony is in a cyclic form
Cyclic form
Cyclic form is a technique of musical construction, involving multiple sections or movements, in which a theme, melody, or thematic material occurs in more than one movement as a unifying device. Sometimes a theme may occur at the beginning and end Cyclic form is a technique of musical...
: the incomplete "nobilmente" theme from the first movement returns in the finale for a complete grandioso statement after various transformations throughout the work. Elgar wrote, "the opening theme is intended to be simple &, in intention, noble & elevating ... the sort of ideal call – in the sense of persuasion, not coercion or command – & something above every day & sordid things." The musicologist Michael Kennedy
Michael Kennedy (music critic)
Dr. George Michael Sinclair Kennedy CBE is an English biographer, journalist and writer on classical music. He joined the Daily Telegraph at the age of 15 in 1941, and began writing music criticism for it in 1948...
writes "One cannot call it a motto-theme, but it is an idée fixe, and after its first quiet statement, the full orchestra repeat it fortissimo. It gently subsides back to woodwind and violas and abruptly switches to D minor, an extraordinary choice of key for the first allegro of a Symphony in A flat." Reed speculates that Elgar's choice of D minor was a gesture against academic rules. According to the conductor Sir Adrian Boult
Adrian Boult
Sir Adrian Cedric Boult CH was an English conductor. Brought up in a prosperous mercantile family he followed musical studies in England and at Leipzig, Germany, with early conducting work in London for the Royal Opera House and Sergei Diaghilev's ballet company. His first prominent post was...
, the clashing keys arose because someone made a bet with Elgar that he could not compose a symphony in two keys at once. The movement is in traditional sonata form
Sonata form
Sonata form is a large-scale musical structure used widely since the middle of the 18th century . While it is typically used in the first movement of multi-movement pieces, it is sometimes used in subsequent movements as well—particularly the final movement...
with two main themes, a development and a recapitulation. It ends quietly, "an effect of magical stillness".
The second movement is a brisk allegro. Elgar did not call it a scherzo
Scherzo
A scherzo is a piece of music, often a movement from a larger piece such as a symphony or a sonata. The scherzo's precise definition has varied over the years, but it often refers to a movement which replaces the minuet as the third movement in a four-movement work, such as a symphony, sonata, or...
, and though Reed calls it "vivacious", others, including Kennedy, have found it restless and even sinister in parts. A middle section, in B flat, is in Elgar's Wand of Youth vein. He asked orchestras to play it "like something you hear down by the river." As the movement draws to a close it slows down, and its first theme is transformed into the main theme of the slow movement, despite their contrasting tempi and different keys. According to Reed, "Someone once had the temerity to ask Elgar which version, the allegro or the adagio, was written first; but the question was not very well received and the subject was not pursued."
Kennedy says of the adagio that it is "unique among Elgar slow movements in the absence of that anguished yearning usually to be found in his quieter passages. There is no Angst here, instead a benedictory tranquillity..." The second subject of the movement remains in the tranquil vein, and the movement ends in what Reed calls "the astounding effect of the muted trombones in the last five bars … like a voice from another world."
The finale begins in D minor with a slow repeat of one of the subsidiary themes of the first movement, showing Elgar in "one of his most dreamy and mysterious moods." After the introduction there is a restless allegro, with a succession of themes including an "impulsive march-rhythm". The movement builds to a climax and ends with the nobilmente opening theme of the symphony returning "orchestrated with glittering splendour" to bring the work to a "triumphant and confident" conclusion.
Duration
The composer's 1931 EMI recording of the First Symphony plays for 46 minutes and 30 seconds. The BBCBBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
's archives show that in a 1930 broadcast performance Elgar took 46 minutes. Elgar was noted for his brisk tempi in his own music, and later performances have been slower. Elgar's contemporaries, Sir Henry Wood and Sir Hamilton Harty
Hamilton Harty
Sir Hamilton Harty was an Irish and British composer, conductor, pianist and organist. In his capacity as a conductor, he was particularly noted as an interpreter of the music of Berlioz and he was much respected as a piano accompanist of exceptional prowess...
took respectively 50:15 (1930) and 59:45 in 1940. In 1972, while preparing a new recording, Georg Solti
Georg Solti
Sir Georg Solti, KBE, was a Hungarian-British orchestral and operatic conductor. He was a major classical recording artist, holding the record for having received the most Grammy Awards, having personally won 31 as a conductor, including the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. In addition to his...
studied Elgar's 1931 performance. Solti's fast tempi, based on the composer's own, came as a shock to Elgarians accustomed to the broader tempi taken by Harty, Sir John Barbirolli
John Barbirolli
Sir John Barbirolli, CH was an English conductor and cellist. Born in London, of Italian and French parentage, he grew up in a family of professional musicians. His father and grandfather were violinists...
and others in the mid-20th century. Barbirolli's 1963 recording takes 53:53; Solti takes 48:48. Later examples of slower tempi include a 1992 recording conducted by Giuseppe Sinopoli
Giuseppe Sinopoli
-Biography:Sinopoli was born in Venice, Italy, and later studied at the Benedetto Marcello Conservatory in Venice under Ernesto Rubin de Cervin and at Darmstadt, including being mentored in composition with Karlheinz Stockhausen...
(55:18), and a 2001 live recording conducted by Sir Colin Davis
Colin Davis
Sir Colin Rex Davis, CH, CBE is an English conductor. His repertoire is broad, but among the composers with whom he is particularly associated are Mozart, Berlioz, Elgar, Sibelius, Stravinsky and Tippett....
(54:47).
Recordings
The first recording of the symphony was made by the London Symphony OrchestraLondon Symphony Orchestra
The London Symphony Orchestra is a major orchestra of the United Kingdom, as well as one of the best-known orchestras in the world. Since 1982, the LSO has been based in London's Barbican Centre.-History:...
in 1931, conducted by the composer for His Master's Voice. The recording was reissued on long-playing record (LP
LP album
The LP, or long-playing microgroove record, is a format for phonograph records, an analog sound storage medium. Introduced by Columbia Records in 1948, it was soon adopted as a new standard by the entire record industry...
) in 1970, and on compact disc in 1992 as part of EMI
EMI
The EMI Group, also known as EMI Music or simply EMI, is a multinational music company headquartered in London, United Kingdom. It is the fourth-largest business group and family of record labels in the recording industry and one of the "big four" record companies. EMI Group also has a major...
's "Elgar Edition" of all the composer's electrical recordings of his works.
After 1931 the work received no further gramophone recordings until Sir Adrian Boult
Adrian Boult
Sir Adrian Cedric Boult CH was an English conductor. Brought up in a prosperous mercantile family he followed musical studies in England and at Leipzig, Germany, with early conducting work in London for the Royal Opera House and Sergei Diaghilev's ballet company. His first prominent post was...
's 1950 recording. During the 1950s there was only one other new recording of the symphony, and in the 1960s there were only two. In the 1970s there were four new recordings. In the 1980s there were six, and the 1990s saw twelve. Ten new recordings were released in the first decade of the 21st century. Most of the recordings have been by British orchestras and conductors, but exceptions include the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra
Baltimore Symphony Orchestra
The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra is a professional American symphony orchestra based in Baltimore, Maryland.In September 2007, Maestra Marin Alsop led her inaugural concerts as the Orchestra’s twelfth music director, making her the first woman to head a major American orchestra.The BSO Board...
, Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra
Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra
The Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra is an orchestra based in Stuttgart in Germany. The ensemble was founded in 1945 by American occupation authorities as the orchestra for Radio Stuttgart, under the name Sinfonieorchester von Radio Stuttgart...
, Dresden Staatskapelle, and Sydney Symphony Orchestra
Sydney Symphony Orchestra
The Sydney Symphony Orchestra , commonly known as the Sydney Symphony, is an Australian symphony orchestra based in Sydney...
, and conductors Vladimir Ashkenazy
Vladimir Ashkenazy
Vladimir Davidovich Ashkenazy is a Russian-Icelandic conductor and pianist. Since 1972 he has been a citizen of Iceland, his wife Þórunn's country of birth. Since 1978, because of his many obligations in Europe, he and his family have resided in Meggen, near Lucerne in Switzerland...
, Daniel Barenboim
Daniel Barenboim
Daniel Barenboim, KBE is an Argentinian-Israeli pianist and conductor. He has served as music director of several major symphonic and operatic orchestras and made numerous recordings....
, Bernard Haitink
Bernard Haitink
Bernard Johan Herman Haitink, CH, KBE is a Dutch conductor and violinist.- Early life :Haitink was born in Amsterdam, the son of Willem Haitink and Anna Haitink. He studied music at the conservatoire in Amsterdam...
, Tadaaki Otaka
Tadaaki Otaka
is a Japanese-born, British-based conductor. He studied composition, theory, and French horn, at the Toho Gakuen School of Music, and later was a conducting student of Hideo Saito....
, André Previn
André Previn
André George Previn, KBE is an American pianist, conductor, and composer. He is considered one of the most versatile musicians in the world, and is the winner of four Academy Awards for his film work and ten Grammy Awards for his recordings. -Early Life:Previn was born in...
, Constantin Silvestri
Constantin Silvestri
-Early life:Silvestri, born of Austro-Italian-Romanian stock, was brought up on his own by his mother, his father dying from alcoholism and his stepfather dying when the boy was 16. He had learnt how to play the piano and organ before the age of 6. He played the piano in public at 10 and was a...
, Giuseppe Sinopoli, and Leonard Slatkin
Leonard Slatkin
Leonard Edward Slatkin is an American conductor and composer.-Early life and education:Slatkin was born in Los Angeles to a musical family that came from areas of the Russian Empire now in Ukraine. His father Felix Slatkin was the violinist, conductor and founder of the Hollywood String Quartet,...
.
BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
Radio 3
BBC Radio 3
BBC Radio 3 is a national radio station operated by the BBC within the United Kingdom. Its output centres on classical music and opera, but jazz, world music, drama, culture and the arts also feature. The station is the world’s most significant commissioner of new music, and its New Generation...
's "Building a Library" feature, a comparative review of all available recordings, has considered the symphony three times since 1982. The Penguin Guide to Recorded Classical Music
The Penguin Guide to Recorded Classical Music
The Penguin Guide To Recorded Classical Music is a widely-distributed annual publication from Britain published by Penguin Books, reviewing and rating currently available recordings of classical music...
, 2008 edition, contains two pages of reviews of the work. The two recordings recommended by both the BBC and The Penguin Guide are by Boult and the London Philharmonic Orchestra (1977) and Vernon Handley
Vernon Handley
Vernon George "Tod" Handley CBE was a British conductor, known in particular for his support of British composers. He was born of a Welsh father and an Irish mother into a musical family in Enfield, London. He acquired the nickname "Tod" because his feet were turned in at his birth, which his...
with the same orchestra (1979).