Is it time to "cancel" Elgar ?

[french frank]

"Men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please; they do not make it under self-selected circumstances, but under circumstances existing already, given and transmitted from the past. The tradition of all dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brains of the living. And just as they seem to be occupied with revolutionizing themselves and things, creating something that did not exist before, precisely in such epochs of revolutionary crisis they anxiously conjure up the spirits of the past to their service..."

In this "men" do have agency, limited or greater. Hence the possibility of change. Not everyone passively accepts, upholds or reflects the norms of the age, history is the conflict of interests and classes, not a silent movie in which we are all "prisoners". Judgements can and must be made. To suggest other is a greater determinism than any "vulgar" Marxism.

One could write an essay on that quotation as many people have done, more knowledgeably than I could. 'Not everyone passively accepts, upholds or reflects the norms of the age': but most people do. Isn't that what makes them the 'norms'? My point was about condemning the traditions of those dead generations from the perspective of the present. I suppose some people will do that, others, the ones who don't 'passively accept, uphold or reflect the norms of the age', will reflect (more usefully) on the imperfections of the present. One needs to be able to empathise with the dead generations before passing moral judgments on other human beings. Though as John Major said, "Society needs to condemn a little more and understand a little less". Not a political view I agree with.

[Master Jacques]

One could write an essay on that quotation as many people have done, more knowledgeably than I could. 'Not everyone passively accepts, upholds or reflects the norms of the age': but most people do. Isn't that what makes them the 'norms'? My point was about condemning the traditions of those dead generations from the perspective of the present. I suppose some people will do that, others, the ones who don't 'passively accept, uphold or reflect the norms of the age', will reflect (more usefully) on the imperfections of the present. One needs to be able to empathise with the dead generations before passing moral judgments on other human beings. Though as John Major said, "Society needs to condemn a little more and understand a little less". Not a political view I agree with.

To return to Elgar's cancellation, I suppose that this "presentism" you so wisely describe leads to the fashionable failure to empathise with the massive panoply of "Empire" which we saw - probably for the last time - at Queen Elizabeth II's funeral last year. Yet if we possess even the smallest inkling of why so many of our fellow citizens found that spectacle (and the attendant rituals) so moving, powerful and memorable, then surely we shouldn't have any problem finding similar qualities in the exciting military spectacle which Elgar lays out in his Pomp and Circumstance marches.

Even to talk of "cancelling" Elgar's overtly patriotic works panders to something which is destabilising not only society, but all of us as individuals within it. And that in turn is a mark of disrespect to humanity, past, present and future.

[Serial_Apologist]

To return to Elgar's cancellation, I suppose that this "presentism" you so wisely describe leads to the fashionable failure to empathise with the massive panoply of "Empire" which we saw - probably for the last time - at Queen Elizabeth II's funeral last year. Yet if we possess even the smallest inkling of why so many of our fellow citizens found that spectacle (and the attendant rituals) so moving, powerful and memorable, then surely we shouldn't have any problem finding similar qualities in the exciting military spectacle which Elgar lays out in his Pomp and Circumstance marches.

Even to talk of "cancelling" Elgar's overtly patriotic works panders to something which is destabilising not only society, but all of us as individuals within it. And that in turn is a mark of disrespect to humanity, past, present and future.

I hope you meant this hyperbolic statement to be taken ironically, otherwise you've suddenly and inexplicably stopped making any sense at all - at least to my mind!

[RichardB]

exciting military spectacle

Oxymoron of the day!

[Serial_Apologist]

Oxymoron of the day!

I note that the barometric pressure over the UK is exceptionally high today, and am wondering if this is having the effect of causing one or two normally reasonable posters to be manifesting distinct signs of having "flipped"!

[Master Jacques]

I note that the barometric pressure over the UK is exceptionally high today, and am wondering if this is having the effect of causing one or two normally reasonable posters to be manifesting distinct signs of having "flipped"!

Well! This Forum never ceases to surprise me. I thought I was telescoping a couple of pretty uncontroversial points here:

(1) that the Pomp and Circumstance marches would not have become the focus of so much opprobrium, if they hadn't been so exciting, to so many of our fellow citizens. If they'd been at the lower voltage of (say) Bax's Coronation March of 1953, I don't suppose a single hackle would be raised.

(2) that this excitement is largely generated by what they evoke in people's minds: military pageantry, soldiers in brightly colourful uniforms, horses and jingling spurs, marching smartly through London on a bright morning, in times long past.

(3) this in turn creates for many other people other images, of the oppressions of Empire, which form an ironic counterpoint to the music.

Elgar, don't you agree?, is not responsible for (3).

[Ian Thumwood]

I have had a lot of pleasure reading the responses to this thread over the weekend. There are some good arguments in favour of Elgar but I was surprised that there were not more who shared my opinion of Elgar. For what it is worth, my position would be that if the music does not cut the mustard, history will consign the music to oblivion without any need for it to be "cancelled." I think this applies to all art. Hence the reason the more obscure Elgar remains unfamiliar in the Uk let alone the rest of the world where even his better known works are seen as novelties. I remember speaking with a friend many years ago who taught at the Lyon conservatoire and who was aghast to learn that we had Classical composers in the UK. Apparently even things like Holst's "planets" are not necessary familiar to people outside the Engish-speaking world. It is far from being mainstream repertoire.

Picking up on some of the comments in the thread, I woulc concur that thenationalistic premise of Wagner's operas are no less ridiculous than how we perceive Elgar in the Uk. Wagner is not someone I would consider listenin to as I do not like opera but I can appreciate his influence as an orchestrator and just how influential he was with regard to things such as film music. I do feel that classical music from the British Isles is probably quite problematic. Even great composers like Henry Purcell can raise awkward questions but I think the classical music in our country is somewhat blighted by the German assessment that we were a "land without music." Just as Sonny Rollins' comment about jazz being "the sound of surprise" has a degree of baggage insofar as a misunderstanding as to what Rollins acutally meant by "surprise", I feel that there is constantly a need for British classical music to justify itself, regardless of how necessary this is. Consequently, people get very touchy over the reputations of various British composers and the first stand point always seems to be one of defence.

One question that always intrigues me is national identity, especially as far as the English are concerned. This is particularly fascinating to me in a historical, non-,musical context as the question is exceedingly complex. In my opinion, the question was ultimately down by the Victorians so that the way Elgar would have seen this would have been hopelessly skewed. Certainly, the cncept would have been unknown to people from Roman Britannia and Medieval England which are two eras of history that I love. Elgar seems to be a key facit in establishing what it means to be "English" albeit his Catholicism may actually have marked him as an outsider. I wonder how many people have actually considered this and thought just how much this affects his position as an "English " composer ? For me, I find the fact that religion was such as issue for him actually makes him more problematic for me - even though I actually live in a parish very much associated with the Oxford Movement and John Keble which sought to reconcile Catholicism with the C of E. Elgar would have been very much aware of this movement. It is fascinating how Elgar's music can been seen to be "typically English" as if such a thing could exist. We would tend to class him alongside the likes of Shakespeare, Dickens, Turner or Constable.

I think the argument can actually be taken even further when you consider other composer's of that generation and afterwards who pursued a sort of romanticised version of "Celtic culture" , as if such a thing ever actually existed. (If you know anything about archaeology, it is pretty clear that this is a ridiculous conceit.) I would specifically flag up Arnold Bax in this context. This seemed to be a real issue across Europe with composers trying to reflect a false sense of national identity in their music yet most lacked the rigor of someone like Bartok whose knowledge and research unquestionably made his approach the most "authentic" of his contemporaries with the exception of the likes of Kodaly or Enescu. Understanding English / British culture is incredibaly complex and i find it a challenge to accept Elgar as some sort of benchmark for our culture.

If I am honest, Elgar is a composer I would like to be able to appreciate yet, as is the case with so much Late Romantic music, it just seems over-blown and the oeuvre had long-since outstood it's welcome by 1911 when the 2nd Symphony was written. I am aware that an often cited criticism of Baroque music was that it eventually came a bit "samey" and ultimately required a new generation of composers to see beyond that. What is there left to say in this ouevre after JS Bach ? The same applies to music 150 years later to my ears and I similarly find there is as many issues with Romanticism by the turn of the last century. This applies as much to composers as diverse a Dvorak, Rachmaninoff and Brahms as much as to Elgar. In my ears, they were all flogging a dead horse and, in the hands of lesser composers, the music almost seems pointless. Of that ilk, i much prefer composers such as Scriabin or Delius who had realised that Romanticism needed to evolve to stay relevant.

The other factor which I feel is really important is our self-doubt and ability to question both our history and culture. No many other countries seem capable of doing this yet, with classical music, I sense that it results in a polarising effect on the reputation of our classical culture. There are tendencies to both over-praise the work of English / British composers which baffles our fellow, foriegn music fans and to conversely write their abilities off completely. The fact that there has never been a British Bach, Mozart, Beethoven or even Stravinsky seems to add a degree of uncertainty in our confidence in our own composers. Given the lack of appreciation in their work abroad, this only adds to the neurosis regarding the stature of our composers. I was surprised to read some of the comments regarding how Elgar had been perceived in Germany prior to WW1 and I have to admit that this was totally unexpected. I am happy to be corrected but I do not believe this is the case nowadays. As I said previously, I would be staggered if anyone outside of the Anglo-phone world would be aware of Elgar these days.

[RichardB]

Apparently even things like Holst's "planets" are not necessary familiar to people outside the English-speaking world. It is far from being mainstream repertoire.

I don't know where you get that from, or how much time you've spent looking into what "classical" music gets played outside the UK, but The Planets certainly is mainstream repertoire wherever there are orchestras. For example the Belgrade Philharmonic has played it twice in the last few years, and also two symphonies by Vaughan Williams (but no Elgar). I note from the Elgar Society website that his symphonies, concertos and Enigma Variations are in February 2023 alone being played in Vancouver, Oldenburg, Valencia, Toulouse, Brussels, Cologne, Antwerp, Ghent, Madrid, Stockholm, Gothenburg, Edmonton (Alberta), Amsterdam and NYC. So your friend from Lyon seems not to have known what they were talking about. And perhaps you too ought to assemble a few facts before making the sweeping generalisations in your posts in this thread! I'm not keen on Elgar's music either, as I've said, but the idea that it's destined for oblivion is obviously nonsense.

[Master Jacques]

... As I said previously, I would be staggered if anyone outside of the Anglo-phone world would be aware of Elgar these days.

Prepare to be staggered. Many of the best recordings of Elgar's Symphonies - and the finest performances - these days come from non-Anglophone orchestras, in Europe. My own favourite 1st comes from the Dresden Orchestra. The same's true for RVW symphony recordings these days, also, and in his 150th anniversary year he was very widely performed throughout Europe, especially Germany. The global popularity of English music has sky-rocketed, especially in these days of streaming.

Remember that the jibe of 'Das Land ohne Musik' was popularised as a bit of war propaganda during World War I, having originated from a German critic who was trying to reclaim Handel as a "pure German" composer. 19th c. German artists - including most of the canonic "great composers" - never regarded England as anything of the kind, and were only too keen to come and work here, as our orchestras and choruses were the finest on the planet, and they knew it.

Much of what you have to say about English music and its history has no resonance for me, at any level. There's too much to take issue with, and too little time.

(PS If you are interested in the Romans in Britain, you might well enjoy Elgar's magnificent Caractacus, one of his very best works.)

[BLUESNIK'S REVOX]

"‘I swear that only in Imperialist England could such a work be tolerated,’ Benjamin Britten wrote in his diary following a performance of Edward Elgar’s First Symphony at the 1935 London Proms. Britten was hardly alone in reacting with such distaste. A few years earlier, composer-conductor Constant Lambert claimed to be speaking ‘for the present generation’ when he described Elgar’s music as having ‘an almost intolerable air of smugness, self-assurance and autocratic benevolence’. Other musicians seemed more flummoxed than contemptuous. In 1949, for instance, Sir Thomas Beecham complained that ‘the British public had placed [Elgar] on a pedestal higher than that occupied by any native composer since Purcell’." From a long and interesting piece, positioning & otherwise mostly favourable to Elgar by Andrew Farach-Colton, Gramophone, Feb 20 2018.

I'm pretty sure most here are aware of this piece, but I found it very interesting, carefully venturing as I do over the wire from the Jazz commune into the Classical mainland!

[RichardB]

The global popularity of English music has sky-rocketed

I have the impression that this is indeed the case for early- to mid-20th-century composers, from my vantage point some distance away, in every sense, from Anglophone sensibilities. Of course, music by British composers of later generations is played internationally at least as much as that by composers from anywhere else, and many living British composers find their work performed far more often outside the UK than inside it, leading many of us to relocate elsewhere, which is basically a one-way traffic - I don't hear of German, French, Dutch or Italian composers moving to the UK for the performance opportunities it offers, still less since Brexit of course. It may not be a Land ohne Musik but cultural institutions often seem to be trying hard to make it one.

[Ein Heldenleben]

Prepare to be staggered. Many of the best recordings of Elgar's Symphonies - and the finest performances - these days come from non-Anglophone orchestras, in Europe. My own favourite 1st comes from the Dresden Orchestra. The same's true for RVW symphony recordings these days, also, and in his 150th anniversary year he was very widely performed throughout Europe, especially Germany. The global popularity of English music has sky-rocketed, especially in these days of streaming.

Remember that the jibe of 'Das Land ohne Musik' was popularised as a bit of war propaganda during World War I, having originated from a German critic who was trying to reclaim Handel as a "pure German" composer. 19th c. German artists - including most of the canonic "great composers" - never regarded England as anything of the kind, and were only too keen to come and work here, as our orchestras and choruses were the finest on the planet, and they knew it.

Much of what you have to say about English music and its history has no resonance for me, at any level. There's too much to take issue with, and too little time.

(PS If you are interested in the Romans in Britain, you might well enjoy Elgar's magnificent Caractacus, one of his very best works.)

Absolutely right . I would argue that in the 20th century English music has been amongst the most interesting around .It’s very enlightening to hear foreign performances of Elgar especially ones done by German orchestras under for example Barenboim . It shows that EE travels well.
And as for Caractacus - an anti Imperial masterpiece if ever there was one . Long love the Keltoi!

[Ian Thumwood]

Some interesting posts here which go against my understanding of British classical music. My understanding was that there were few composers rom these shores of note after the the first half of the 18th century. The only name I am aware of until the second half of the 19th century was Mozart's pupil Thomas Attwood whose music I can never profess to have heard. I thought the "land without music" comment had stemmed from an earlier period around the time of Beethoven. Happy to be corrected regarding performances / recordings of British works outside US / UK. Wasn't the whole point of Mendelssohn being invisted to Britain being necessary due to the paucity of our own composers ?

Britten's comments do not surprise me in the least. It is very typical of the future generations to criticise those from the immediate past and I would have been amazed if he had said anything different. His comments echo mine although I think it was unfortunate for him to consider the music to be "Imperialist" as the music Elgar composed is more about a perception of BRitain's role in the world as opposed to Empire building. "imperialist" is not really the right word. It is nationalistic but only insofar that it reflects the aloof perception people had at that time of Britain's place in global politics. Oddily enough, the only time I have heard an English composer's music played in France was actually a performance ofa chamber peace by Britten in Aix-en-Provence. I am even more disinclined towards his music than Elgar's! Is there anything more wretched than the Britten folk song settings so wonderfully satirised by Dudley Moore ?

[pastoralguy]

Some interesting posts here which go against my understanding of British classical music. My understanding was that there were few composers rom these shores of note after the the first half of the 18th century. The only name I am aware of until the second half of the 19th century was Mozart's pupil Thomas Attwood whose music I can never profess to have heard. I thought the "land without music" comment had stemmed from an earlier period around the time of Beethoven. Happy to be corrected regarding performances / recordings of British works outside US / UK. Wasn't the whole point of Mendelssohn being invisted to Britain being necessary due to the paucity of our own composers ?

Britten's comments do not surprise me in the least. It is very typical of the future generations to criticise those from the immediate past and I would have been amazed if he had said anything different. His comments echo mine although I think it was unfortunate for him to consider the music to be "Imperialist" as the music Elgar composed is more about a perception of BRitain's role in the world as opposed to Empire building. "imperialist" is not really the right word. It is nationalistic but only insofar that it reflects the aloof perception people had at that time of Britain's place in global politics. Oddily enough, the only time I have heard an English composer's music played in France was actually a performance ofa chamber peace by Britten in Aix-en-Provence. I am even more disinclined towards his music than Elgar's! Is there anything more wretched than the Britten folk song settings so wonderfully satirised by Dudley Moore ?

[Ein Heldenleben]

Some interesting posts here which go against my understanding of British classical music. My understanding was that there were few composers rom these shores of note after the the first half of the 18th century. The only name I am aware of until the second half of the 19th century was Mozart's pupil Thomas Attwood whose music I can never profess to have heard. I thought the "land without music" comment had stemmed from an earlier period around the time of Beethoven. Happy to be corrected regarding performances / recordings of British works outside US / UK. Wasn't the whole point of Mendelssohn being invisted to Britain being necessary due to the paucity of our own composers ?

Britten's comments do not surprise me in the least. It is very typical of the future generations to criticise those from the immediate past and I would have been amazed if he had said anything different. His comments echo mine although I think it was unfortunate for him to consider the music to be "Imperialist" as the music Elgar composed is more about a perception of BRitain's role in the world as opposed to Empire building. "imperialist" is not really the right word. It is nationalistic but only insofar that it reflects the aloof perception people had at that time of Britain's place in global politics. Oddily enough, the only time I have heard an English composer's music played in France was actually a performance ofa chamber peace by Britten in Aix-en-Provence. I am even more disinclined towards his music than Elgar's! Is there anything more wretched than the Britten folk song settings so wonderfully satirised by Dudley Moore ?

Ian - is this a wind up ? His folk song arrangements are wonderful. Moore beautifully captured some of their delicious harmonic waywardness . The chief humour lies in his wicked send up of Pears.
I think Britten is at least as great a composer as Elgar. Because I’m keen on vocal music esp opera in some ways I think he’s greater.