Read Online Edward Elgar and His World by Byron Adams - Free Book Online Page B

it is far removed from national character.
    It is here that the work of Sir Hubert Parry is so different. His treatment of the big subject of the smallness of man and the largeness of Divine Love is full of a manly reverence and force. In his music man acknowledges the greatness of God without abasing himself. There is no sentimental “whine” in the music. In wholeness of conception, too, the short oratorio is organic. There is none of the wavering between realism and abstract thought that makes the treatment of “The Apostles” so unequal—an inequality that is the cause of the unsatisfactoriness of many of Richard Strauss’s symphonic poems. One is almost tempted to think that the modern composer jumps from an abstract treatment of his subject to a realistic for the simple reason that realism gives so many openings for effective orchestral writing. Sir Hubert Parry has apparently no sympathies with that view of art. The form of oratorio rightly remains in his mind as a form of art in which abstract thought can be best expressed—indeed, it is the very essential of oratorio. In his “The Love that casteth out Fear,” the composer has made a very effective use of a semichorus as the Divine voice. In the cathedral this had a fine effect of aloofness. In other ways the work is a good example of the composition of the ‘Job” period of the composer’s creative career. 52 The sincerity of the music and its breadth of feeling, peculiarly characteristic of the composer, made their own impression, but the specific musical invention and inspiration of the work are not on the same level as the conception. Were they so the new Gloucester oratorio would be on an infinitely higher plane than “The Apostles.”
    That work of Elgar’s has certainly more inspiration and shows a clearer call for musical composition. Indeed, many of its pages contain some of the most impressive music of modern days. As at first, the Judas music seems to me the most successful of the whole oratorio. It is a veritable inspiration and shows a great advance in the composer’s grasp of declamatory style. The new point which the Gloucester performance brought out was the real power and beauty of the final “Ascension” section. Here the composer rises to a big musical climax—not a climax of mere orchestral noise and the piling up of choral complexities, but a climax of feeling and conception. There is nothing in “The Dream of Gerontius” to equal the glow of feeling of this section of the later work. The performance of the Gloucester choir, although by no means perfect in detail, was singularly expressive and intelligent. Evidently the work had been splendidly rehearsed by the organists of the Three Choirs, and the chorus sang as if it entered fully into the meaning of the oratorio. Sir Hubert Parry’s work, on the other hand, was not well presented. The composer himself conducted, and his talents do not run towards the direction of large choral and orchestral forces.
    â€”E. A. B AUGHAN
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    Part IV: The London Choral Society Performance (February 13, 1905)
    Founded in 1903 by the conductor of the Dulwich Philharmonic Society, Arthur Fagge, the London Choral Society specialized in performing British choral works, particularly those that were new or were perceived to be unjustly neglected. 53 Elgar was central to the Society’s activities during its first two seasons; at least one work by Elgar was featured in all five of the Society’s concerts in 1904–1905 (these included two performances of Gerontius). This was presumably not because Elgar’s music was felt to be underperformed but because it was well-known to the singers and attracted large audiences: two imperatives for a conductor attempting to establish the reputation of a new choir.
    The Apostles was the third concert of the 1904–1905 season and took place, as did all the London Choral