Elgar's The Apostles at the Bridgewater Hall, Manchester Hallé/Sir Mark Elder

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I don't know whether this concert has been mentioned anywhere, but Elgarians will be pleased to know that "The Apostles" is to be performed in the Bridgewater Hall on 5th May.

http://www.halle.co.uk/concerts-tickets.aspx?month=5&year=2012

I've already booked our tickets. I do have the secret hope that Sir Mark Elder will use a real shofar, instead of a trumpet pretending to be one.
When the planned CD of the performance is issued, it would be great to have one that used the correct instrument used. I wonder whether the composer's own performances used a shofar?

[Beef Oven]

I don't know whether this concert has been mentioned anywhere, but Elgarians will be pleased to know that "The Apostles" is to be performed in the Bridgewater Hall on 5th May.

http://www.halle.co.uk/concerts-tickets.aspx?month=5&year=2012

I've already booked our tickets. I do have the secret hope that Sir Mark Elder will use a real shofar, instead of a trumpet pretending to be one.
When the planned CD of the performance is issued, it would be great to have one that used the correct instrument used. I wonder whether the composer's own performances used a shofar?

Thanks for booking our tickets, I'm looking forward to it

[Nick Armstrong]

Thanks for booking our tickets, I'm looking forward to it

Which train you getting, Beefy? Want to hook up for a pint before?

[Beef Oven]

Which train you getting, Beefy? Want to hook up for a pint before?

Gonna drive up - meet you at Watford Gap and hook up for a couple of wet ones with Aus italien - let him choose the pub, he was kind enough to get the tickets for the entire Radio 3 Forum!! Bloody decent bloke

[Nick Armstrong]

Gonna drive up - meet you at Watford Gap and hook up for a couple of wet ones with Aus italien - let him choose the pub, he was kind enough to get the tickets for the entire Radio 3 Forum!! Bloody decent bloke

Looks like a plan

Cheers Alps!

[Roehre]

When the planned CD of the performance is issued, it would be great to have one that used the correct instrument used. I wonder whether the composer's own performances used a shofar?

I seem to recall a lecture re The Apostles in which was said a shofar was used at its premiere.
If I only could find that quote....

[Nick Armstrong]

I'm sorry. I have to say it...

Shofar so good!

[Pabmusic]

I seem to recall a lecture re The Apostles in which was said a shofar was used at its premiere.
If I only could find that quote....

A ram's horn was not used. Elgar was quite set against it. On August 28th 1903 (about five weeks before the premiere) he wrote to Hans Richter. He used a typewriter - a new toy:

"My dear Friend,

…I write this on the Schreibmaschine, first, to shew you that it is not broken, and second, so that you shall not have the trouble to decipher my poor dilapidated writing…

There is a part for the ‘Shofar’, (the Hebrew Ram’s horn) – of course the real instrument, which I am told is treacherous and next to impossible to use musically, cannot be used: for the sake of effect and contrast I should like the short passage which stands out, to be played on the long trumpet; in the list of trumpet players I see Mr [Walter] Morrow is included; to save time I have asked him if the passage can be performed no [sic] the long trumpet as I wish: he says Yes, - I have told him I will ask you if you will allow this and he shall play it, reserving…the first trumpet part (which goes on at the same time, partly wih [sic] the Shofar) for Mr Valk. Mr Morrow would, always with your permission, bring his longest and SHINIEST T R U M M M M M M P E T T!!!! Capable of producing a Shofar ‘Call’.

That is what I want.

The weather has been deplorable…

Ever your affectionate friend and (musically) godson,

E d w a r d E l g a r ."

In the event, Elgar conducted, because the score didn't arrive in time for Richter to learn it (no doubt prompting memories of Gerontius).

I think people have confused 'Shofar' with 'the real instrument' over the years, but it's clear that Elgar wanted a post-horn.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Thanks, Pabmusic. That's most interesting. But Edward Gardner used one in that BBC4 Elgar documentary not so long ago.
The question now is, "Why did Elgar write "Shofar" in the score, rather than "post-horn" or "longest and shiniest trumpet"?
But the letter says it all really, and it's a bit of a kick in the teeth to our dear old HIPPster friends who are so compulsive-obsessive about what is written in the score.

[Pabmusic]

Thanks, Pabmusic. That's most interesting. But Edward Gardner used one in that BBC4 Elgar documentary not so long ago.
The question now is, "Why did Elgar write "Shofar" in the score, rather than "post-horn" or "longest and shiniest trumpet"?
But the letter says it all really, and it's a bit of a kick in the teeth to our dear old HIPPster friends who are so compulsive-obsessive about what is written in the score.

I agree entirely. I think Elgar was delighted at the idea of a Shofar. By that I mean the intellectual notion of a Shofar - it all involved consulting a Rabbi, choosing some ancient chants and reproducing ancient Jewish sounds (there's some stuff in the percussion as well). I'm sure Elgar enjoyed that every bit as much as writing the music - a bit like a child with a new enthusiasm (very typical!).

But Elgar was too good a practical musician to expect the original instrument to be available or viable (at least in Birmingham in 1903). The notes are pitched (concert E-flat and the C above) so finding a ram's horn in tune would have been a problem to start with. Then there's its carrying power - it appears against the full orchestra playing loudly. That may be possible (just) now, and it worked on the John Bridcut documentary, but it does seem to be rather a long way from what was in Elgar's mind. Clearly he 'heard' something more akin to the natural trumpet that appears in RVW's Pastoral Symphony, but pitched high in the harmonic series (like a horn, though at a higher pitch) so that the leaps from E-flat to C can be elided.

Incidentally, it seems likely that Elgar had not actually heard a Shofar, for he writes: "...the real instrument, which I am told is treacherous...". I am sure that if he'd seen one, he wouldn't have relied on what he'd been told.

I wonder how the Edward Gardner version would carry in a concert hall or cathedral?

[Roehre]

Thanks, Pabmusic. That's most interesting. But Edward Gardner used one in that BBC4 Elgar documentary not so long ago.
The question now is, "Why did Elgar write "Shofar" in the score, rather than "post-horn" or "longest and shiniest trumpet"?
But the letter says it all really, and it's a bit of a kick in the teeth to our dear old HIPPster friends who are so compulsive-obsessive about what is written in the score.

Thanks Pabmusic and EA. That's what I got in my head re the shofar, I had seen it recently.

[John Skelton]

Another example - Janáček's knowledge of the viols d'amore was more associative than practical, I think?

But the letter says it all really, and it's a bit of a kick in the teeth to our dear old HIPPster friends who are so compulsive-obsessive about what is written in the score.

How true. Annotated Western European 'classical' music is full of parts for whimsical, quasi-imagined, instruments like Elgar's 'Shofar', and even if it isn't there's still the need for much more sensible and sensitive people who know so much better than the idiot composers what they did and didn't want to intervene. All the nonsense written in those ridiculous scores! All the opportunities for vastly superior later instruments to replace the ones older composers had to put up with, the sound of which they couldn't possibly have liked, to make all music sound as if it was written in the late nineteenth / early twentieth century.

[MrGongGong]

How true. Annotated Western European 'classical' music is full of parts for whimsical, quasi-imagined, instruments like Elgar's 'Shofar', all of which need to be corrected and replaced by much more sensible and sensitive people who know so much better than the idiot composers what they did and didn't want. All the nonsense written in those ridiculous scores! All the opportunities for vastly superior later instruments to replace the ones older composers had to put up with, the sound of which they couldn't possibly have liked, to make all music sound as if it was written in the late nineteenth / early twentieth century.

Had Elgar actually HEARD the sound of the Shofar ?
at least Debussy really did hear Javanese Gamelan rather than imagine it ..............

Steve Reich had some interesting things to say about this in "Writings about Music" (1974)

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

But the letter says it all really, and it's a bit of a kick in the teeth to our dear old HIPPster friends who are so compulsive-obsessive about what is written in the score.

The only performance of The Apostles in which I have performed used an authentic Shofar played brilliantly by Crispian Steele-Perkins (no relation, as far as I know, to Sue).
Of course, if the instrument had been available to Elgar, and had he heard such excellent playing of it, then surely he would've preferred it to the Posthorn?

[MrGongGong]

Alvin is the man methinks

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WigVvYGBHEQ

as is

Crispian Steele-Perkins of course

though i'd go a long way to hear Alvin's piece .............