Is it time to "cancel" Elgar ?

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I just don't see the point of negative threads like this. They don't rouse enthusiasm and I have less than zero interest that Ian Thumwood (or anyone else) dislikes Elgar (or any other composer).

What I want to see is someone communicating their enthusiasm, whether for a given composer/work or recording, that makes you want to listen with fresh ears or make new discoveries. Negativity achieves nothing.

Absolutely. The topic reminds me of those Facebook threads where someone says “I’m leaving this group”, which is usually followed by responses such as “We’re not at the airport, so there’s no need to announce your departure”.

That said, if Elgar is to be cancelled, please could this cataclysmic event be delayed for another 3 or 4 years, to enable me to collect the remaining volumes of the Elgar Complete Edition. I’ve been subscribing to this since 1981, and would like to make my collection complete (44 volumes).

My unmissable Elgar works are
Caractacus
Enigma Variations
The Apostles
The Kingdom
Symphony no. 1
Violin Concerto
Symphony no 2
A Voice in the Desert
The Spirit of England
Cello Concerto

Incidentally, very little of Elgar’s music is jingoistic. A march is a march, whatever the country of origin. Works that could be categorised in this way are
The Banner of St George (in a harmless way)
Caractacus (but only the final chorus)
The Crown of India (definitely)
Carillon (but this is more about Belgium than Britain

The song Land of Hope and Glory clearly is, but that was hardly Elgar’s fault, as the words were added later. It’s inclusion in the Coronation Ode (with changed words) is much less so.
The Spirit of England isn’t jingoistic at all, despite the title.

[Serial_Apologist]

Absolutely. The topic reminds me of those Facebook threads where someone says “I’m leaving this group”, which is usually followed by responses such as “We’re not at the airport, so there’s no need to announce your departure”.

That said, if Elgar is to be cancelled, please could this cataclysmic event be delayed for another 3 or 4 years, to enable me to collect the remaining volumes of the Elgar Complete Edition. I’ve been subscribing to this since 1981, and would like to make my collection complete (44 volumes).

My unmissable Elgar works are
Caractacus
Enigma Variations
The Apostles
The Kingdom
Symphony no. 1
Violin Concerto
Symphony no 2
A Voice in the Desert
The Spirit of England
Cello Concerto

Incidentally, very little of Elgar’s music is jingoistic. A march is a march, whatever the country of origin. Works that could be categorised in this way are
The Banner of St George (in a harmless way)
Caractacus (but only the final chorus)
The Crown of India (definitely)
Carillon (but this is more about Belgium than Britain

The song Land of Hope and Glory clearly is, but that was hardly Elgar’s fault, as the words were added later. It’s inclusion in the Coronation Ode (with changed words) is much less so.
The Spirit of England isn’t jingoistic at all, despite the title.

I personally don't much like marches - mainly for their questionable associations and persuasive power over reason, though I have to acknowledge that they do include some good tunes, and for lack of anything more rousing - Gospel music and its secular counterpart Soul had another quarter century to wait before hitting British ears - probably comprised a lot of what people in many nations thought of as their own popular vernaculars. I feel sure Mahler's love of the march did not make him a warmonger! Some probably still do if we look at the thousands camped along the Mall before any royal event.

[ahinton]

Absolutely. The topic reminds me of those Facebook threads where someone says “I’m leaving this group”, which is usually followed by responses such as “We’re not at the airport, so there’s no need to announce your departure”.

!!!

My unmissable Elgar works are
Caractacus
Enigma Variations
The Apostles
The Kingdom
Symphony no. 1
Violin Concerto
Symphony no 2
A Voice in the Desert
The Spirit of England
Cello Concerto

Mine are
Enigma Variations
Gerontius
All three symphonies (yes!)
Violin Concerto
Cello Concerto
Alassio
Falstaff
Owls
Violin Sonata
String Quartet
Piano Quintet

Incidentally, very little of Elgar’s music is jingoistic. A march is a march, whatever the country of origin.

Er, yes - nothing very English about those of Mahler...

Works that could be categorised in this way are
The Banner of St George (in a harmless way)
Caractacus (but only the final chorus)
The Crown of India (definitely)
Carillon (but this is more about Belgium than Britain)

Crown of India is just awful and is the one outstanding (as in sore thumb) example of Engar in Imperialist jingoistic mode, which is why it seems so uncharacteristic.

The song Land of Hope and Glory clearly is, but that was hardly Elgar’s fault, as the words were added later.

Land of Hopeless Ingloriousness did not meet with Elgar's approval at all when it got stuck onto his PC1...

[french frank]

I just don't see the point of negative threads like this.

Even threads that start negatively result in revelations and interesting information. In fact, as may be seen, they rouse a lot of enthusiasm, and so the discussion moves on. Read, mark, learn …

[ChandlersFord]

Congratters to the OP for the wonderful clickbait thread title, which is doing its work well ....


Really, if you leave aside the usual suspects (Gerontius, EV, Cello Concerto and the P&C Marches), Elgar is a relatively under-performed composer, even in britain. Performances of the Second Symphony are rare - I’ve only heard it ‘live’ once - so the burghers of Basingstoke were very privileged to have britain’s finest provincial orchestra come and visit them to perform it.

I don’t hear any nostalgia for empire in Elgar’s music (I wonder if people would be so ready to hear it if they had no preconceived notions about the composer?) and we know that EE’s attitude to this subject was far more ambivalent than, say, Kipling’s. It’s a known fact (and it was known at the time) that Elgar was a Tory who found all forms of socialism frightening (even the very mild and ultra-democratic type advocated by his good friend George Bernard Shaw), and that he was a person of strong, though not unquestioned, faith. My own problem with EE is that I am not, and never have been, either a Catholic or a person in whose life ‘faith/religion’ has played a central role. I think this makes certain of his works - the oratorios on religious/biblical themes - hard to access; so, while I can enjoy Gerontius on a ‘pictorial’ level, I can’t really engage with it and, for that reason, it’ll never be one of my favourites.

Cancelling Elgar makes no more sense than cancelling Tchaikovsky (who, incidentally, would have been 100 per cent behind all Putin’s policies, including the invasion of Ukraine and the persecution of homosexuals). In neither case do their personal politics intrude into their music. Really, cancelling (of anyone) makes no sense at all.

[Joseph K]

I like Elgar, and took a module on his music when I was at uni. I like both symphonies, the Cello Concerto and the Enigma Variations. I don't listen much to his music, but I don't find it difficult to separate his music from politics or race.

I wonder, Ian, do you think Wagner ought to be cancelled?

This thread just makes me want to listen to some Elgar - so it seems it probably has the opposite effect of the one Ian intended.

[Barbirollians]

I like Elgar, and took a course on his music when I was at uni. I like both symphonies, the Cello Concerto and the Enigma Variations. I don't listen much to his music, but I don't find it difficult to separate his music from politics or race.

I wonder, Ian, do you think Wagner ought to be cancelled?

This thread just makes me want to listen to some Elgar - so it seems it probably has the opposite effect of the one Ian intended.

An excellent point surely Wagner a much better candidate for cancellation ? Or perhaps not . What about Gesualdo - clearly a very nasty piece of work ?

By all means say you don't like it or it has particular associations for you that you do not like but saying Elgar 2 is a load of old claptrap says more about the poster than the piece.

Was it not VW who was outraged by the "cancellation " of Alan Bush for Communism ?

[Ein Heldenleben]

Congratters to the OP for the wonderful clickbait thread title, which is doing its work well ....


Really, if you leave aside the usual suspects (Gerontius, EV, Cello Concerto and the P&C Marches), Elgar is a relatively under-performed composer, even in britain. Performances of the Second Symphony are rare - I’ve only heard it ‘live’ once - so the burghers of Basingstoke were very privileged to have britain’s finest provincial orchestra come and visit them to perform it.

I don’t hear any nostalgia for empire in Elgar’s music (I wonder if people would be so ready to hear it if they had no preconceived notions about the composer?) and we know that EE’s attitude to this subject was far more ambivalent than, say, Kipling’s. It’s a known fact (and it was known at the time) that Elgar was a Tory who found all forms of socialism frightening (even the very mild and ultra-democratic type advocated by his good friend George Bernard Shaw), and that he was a person of strong, though not unquestioned, faith. My own problem with EE is that I am not, and never have been, either a Catholic or a person in whose life ‘faith/religion’ has played a central role. I think this makes certain of his works - the oratorios on religious/biblical themes - hard to access; so, while I can enjoy Gerontius on a ‘pictorial’ level, I can’t really engage with it and, for that reason, it’ll never be one of my favourites.

Cancelling Elgar makes no more sense than cancelling Tchaikovsky (who, incidentally, would have been 100 per cent behind all Putin’s policies, including the invasion of Ukraine and the persecution of homosexuals). In neither case do their personal politics intrude into their music. Really, cancelling (of anyone) makes no sense at all.

Good posts Chandlers and Alps . With the great slow movement from Thursdays performance still reverberating through my brain I am struck by how much of Elgar’s music is an exploration of the composers own passionate emotions- often aroused by friendships with men like Jaeger (Nimrod in the Enigma ) and Alfred Rodewald - the original In Memoriam of the second symphony Funeral March. Then the love affairs with Alice Elgar and Helen Weaver - all made eternal in music. He is a great English Romantic like Matthew Arnold and Tennyson - outwardly maybe buttoned up but inside as passionate as Mahler or Tschaikovsky. Has any one ever celebrated friendship so magnificently as Elgar does in the Enigma? Frederick Ashton absolutely understood it in his great Pas de Deux with Jaeger and Elgar in his ballet of the Enigma Variations. But underpinning it all is this deep melancholy.It’s no surprise he composed little after Alice’s death. Jingoistic? No - above all a composer whose work is shot through with love. And I don’t know about you but that’s something I don’t want to cancel.

[ChandlersFord]

An excellent point surely Wagner a much better candidate for cancellation ? Or perhaps not . What about Gesualdo - clearly a very nasty piece of work ?

By all means say you don't like it or it has particular associations for you that you do not like but saying Elgar 2 is a load of old claptrap says more about the poster than the piece.

Was it not VW who was outraged by the "cancellation " of Alan Bush for Communism ?

I believe Wagner was cancelled (in britain) during WW2, along with most other German composers, including the notorious Bismarck admirer Brahms.

Not sure whether Mendelssohn (a special case, and still popular in those days) got different treatment .....

[cloughie]

Heldenleben 1 Thumwood 0

Elgar’s Sym 2 is a great work - almost surpassing Elgar 1

There are much stronger candidates for cancellation!

[RichardB]

I wonder, Ian, do you think Wagner ought to be cancelled?

Or perhaps, given Ian's preferences, the wife-beating sometime pimp Miles Davis ought to be cancelled.

My view of Elgar is certainly coloured by his jingoistic pieces, but I just don't really like the sound of his music in general, and, if I did, I probably wouldn't always have those marches in the back of my mind whenever I hear anything else by him. Maybe I'll get over that some time. But there's so much other music, and the amount of it is increasing all the time of course, that I would rather spend my time with.

[Master Jacques]

The whole idea of "cancelling" anyone, or their music, for any reason, is chilling.

If Elgar's music disturbs anyone's presentist preconceptions about 'empire' (or any other matter, political, social or aesthetic) then good for Elgar. Challenging our individual prejudices and preconceptions is one of the things which art does best. Good art invites us to broaden our sympathies.

(Mind you, having been accused myself earlier this week of being a cheerleader for "cancel culture", perhaps I'm guilty of hypocrisy!)

[Ein Heldenleben]

The whole idea of "cancelling" anyone, or their music, for any reason, is chilling.

If Elgar's music disturbs anyone's presentist preconceptions about 'empire' (or any other matter, political, social or aesthetic) then good for Elgar. Challenging our individual prejudices and preconceptions is one of the things which art does best. Good art invites us to broaden our sympathies.

(Mind you, having been accused myself earlier this week of being a cheerleader for "cancel culture", perhaps I'm guilty of hypocrisy!)

I think the Germans were right to “cancel” the Horst Wessel Lied. Struggling to think of much else .

[Master Jacques]

I think the Germans were right to “cancel” the Horst Wessel Lied. Struggling to think of much else .

Going off topic a little, but it's arguable that the strict post-war German and Austrian bans on the Horst-Wessel-Lied have only served to fuel the ugly resurrection of neo-fascism. Laughing at the thing would have done more good.

With Elgar, just think how hugely popular the Pomp and Circumstance marches would become, in rather shady corners of UK Society, if they were to be "cancelled". [Shiver]

[Nick Armstrong]

The whole idea of "cancelling" anyone, or their music, for any reason, is chilling.

Yes the whole concept of ‘I don’t like it so no-one has the right to experience it’ is one of the madder aspects of modern life (echoing the most sinister passages of human history). Absolute nonsense.