557710bk Elgar US 25/9/06 12:48 pm Page 8 Where keep the saints, with harp and song, A grim, gray coast and a seaboard ghastly, An endless endless sabbath morning, And shores trod seldom by feet of men - And on that sea commixed with fire, Where the batter’d hull and the broken mast lie, ELGAR They have lain embedded these long years ten. Oft drop their eyelids raised too long To the full Godhead’s burning. Love! Love! When we wandered here together, Hand in hand! through the sparkling weather, Sea Pictures $ Where Corals Lie From the heights and hollows of fern and heather, Richard Garnett (1835-1906) God surely loved us a little then. The Music Makers The deeps have music soft and low The skies were fairer, the shores were firmer - Sarah Connolly, Mezzo-Soprano When winds awake the airy spry, The blue sea over the bright sand roll’d; It lures me, lures me on to go Babble and prattle, and ripple and murmur, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and Chorus And see the land where corals lie. Sheen of silver and glamour of gold. By mount and mead, by lawn and rill, So, girt with tempest and wing’d with thunder Simon Wright When night is deep, and moon is high, And clad with lightning and shod with sleet, That music seeks and finds me still, And strong winds treading the swift waves under And tells me where the corals lie. The flying rollers with frothy feet. Yes, press my eyelids close, ’tis well, One gleam like a bloodshot sword-blade swims on But far the rapid fancies fly The sky line, staining the green gulf crimson, The rolling worlds of wave and shell, A death-stroke fiercely dealt by a dim sun And all the lands where corals lie. That strikes through his stormy winding sheet. Thy lips are like a sunset glow, O brave white horses! you gather and gallop, Thy smile is like a morning sky, The storm sprite loosens the gusty rains; Yet leave me, leave me, let me go O brave white horses! you gather and gallop, And see the land where corals lie. The storm sprite loosens the gusty rains; % The Swimmer Now the stoutest ship were the frailest shallop Adam Lindsay Gordon (1833-1870) In your hollow backs, on your high-arched manes. I would ride as never man has ridden With short, sharp violent lights made vivid, In your sleepy, swirling surges hidden; To southward far as the sight can roam, Only the swirl of the surges livid, I would ride as never man has ridden The seas that climb and the surfs that comb. To gulfs foreshadow’d through strifes forbidden, Where no light wearies and no love wanes. Only the crag and the cliff to nor’ward, Where no love, no love wanes. The rocks receding, and reefs flung forward, Waifs wreck’d seaward and wasted shoreward, On shallows sheeted with flaming foam. 8.557710 8 557710bk Elgar US 25/9/06 12:48 pm Page 2 Edward Elgar (1857–1934) Sea Pictures, Op. 37 The Music Makers, Op. 69 • Sea Pictures, Op. 37 ! Sea Slumber-Song Closely cling, for waves beat fast, Edward Elgar was born near Worcester. By the age of ten society. Sketches for it date from the turn of the century, Roden Berkeley Wriothesley Noel (1834-1894) Foam-flakes cloud the hurrying blast; he had composed music for a family play which years but the final impetus to complete it was a commission Love alone will last. later became incorporated into the Wand of Youth Suites from the Birmingham Triennial Festival. Elgar conducted Sea-birds are asleep, (1907, 1908). Apart from violin lessons he had no formal the première on 1st October 1912 with Muriel Foster as The world forgets to weep, Kiss my lips, and softly say: musical training, but from the age of sixteen he began to soloist. Even though his mastery of orchestral and choral Sea murmurs her soft slumber-song Joy, sea-swept, may fade to-day; earn his living as a freelance violinist, teacher, organist writing is evident throughout, the critics received it On the shadowy sand Love alone will stay. and conductor. Marriage in 1889 marked a significant tepidly, complaining both about the quality of the poetry Of this elfin land; step forward in his career since in Caroline Alice Roberts and Elgar’s use of quotations mainly from his own works. # Sabbath Morning at Sea he found a remarkable partner who recognised his genius Yet in the context of the poetic conceit, it was quite I, the Mother mild, Elizabeth Barret Browning (1806-1861) and supported his ambitions. A brief period in London logical for Elgar to do so. Furthermore he had a worthy Hush thee, oh my child, trying to establish himself as a composer proved desultory precedent in the ‘Works of Peace’ section of Richard Forget the voices wild! The ship went on with solemn face; and forced a return to Worcestershire. In the 1890s, Strauss’s Ein Heldenleben, where his friend had made a Hush thee, oh my child, To meet the darkness on the deep, however, he became widely known in the provinces feature of self-quotation too. Significantly Elgar had Hush thee. The solemn ship went onward. through his overture Froissart (1890), and with a series of attended the British première of the work in December I bowed down weary in the place; choral works including Caractacus (1897-8). 1902, the time when he was first sketching ideas for The Isles in elfin light For parting tears and present sleep National prominence was finally secured by the Music Makers. In reality the quotations only take up a Dream, the rocks and caves, Had weighed mine eyelids downward. success of the Enigma Variations (1898-9) and although small proportion of the work; moreover they are Lulled by whispering waves, the première of The Dream of Gerontius (1899-1900) was brilliantly integrated. In describing the music Elgar wrote Veil their marbles bright. The new sight, the new wondrous sight! a disaster, subsequent performances revealed it a that its atmosphere ‘is mainly sad; but there are moments Foam glimmers faintly white The waters around me, turbulent, masterpiece. During the years prior to the First World of enthusiasm, and bursts of joy occasionally approaching Upon the shelly sand The skies, impassive o’er me, War, Elgar’s achievements continued with works like the frenzy; moods which the creative artist suffers in creating Of this elfin land; Calm in a moonless, sunless light, oratorios, The Apostles (1902-3) and The Kingdom (1901- or in contemplation of the unending influence of his As glorified by even the intent 6), the two symphonies (1904, 1907-8), (1905-11), the creation.’ Sea-sound, like violins, Of holding the day glory! Violin Concerto (1905, 1909-10), and the tone poem An orchestral prelude introduces the two principal To slumber woos and wins, Falstaff (1913). In a lighter vein his Pomp and themes of the work, the first a passionate, restless melody I murmur my soft slumber-song, Love me, sweet friends, this sabbath day. Circumstance marches (1901- 1930) brought his name to (marked with Elgar’s characteristic description Leave woes, and wails, and sins. The sea sings round me while ye roll afar every strata of society. ‘nobilmente’), the second a tranquil rising phrase played The hymn, unaltered, To the war years belong the choral The Spirit of by the violas and cellos. Shortly after the Enigma theme Ocean’s shadowy might And kneel, where once I knelt to pray, England (1915-17), and then a final harvest, composed in occurs twice. Elgar explained that he incorporated it here Breathes good night, And bless me deeper in your soul the rural quietude of Sussex, brought his major chamber ‘because it expressed … my sense of the loneliness of the Leave woes, and wails, and sins. Because your voice has faltered. music, for example, the Piano Quintet (1918-19), as well artist as described in the first six lines of the ode’. The Good night...Good night... as the Cello Concerto (1918-19). With his wife’s death in hushed chorus, personifying the ‘music makers’ Good night... And though this sabbath comes to me 1919, Elgar’s creative spirit died too; thereafter he themselves, enters to a phrase, which Elgar described as Without the stolèd minister, composed only fitfully, producing the Nursery and Severn representing the ‘artist’. At ‘dreams’ the Judgement motif @ In Haven And chanting congregation, Suites (1930) but nothing else of consequence. from The Dream of Gerontius is quoted, whilst ‘sea Caroline Alice Elgar (1848-1920) God’s Spirit shall give comfort. Elgar identifed intensely with the sentiments of breakers’ aptly brings a hint of Sea Pictures, followed by He who brooded soft on waters drear, Arthur O’ Shaughnessy’s ode The Music Makers, which two more references to Enigma. To stirring music the Closely let me hold thy hand, Creator on creation. propounded that artists are the real creators and second stanza takes wing and at ‘We fashion an empire’s Storms are sweeping sea and land; inspiration for mankind and the true makers of history and glory’, Rule Britannia and La Marseillaise are woven into Love alone will stand. He shall assist me to look higher, 8.557710 2 7 8.557710 557710bk Elgar US 25/9/06 12:48 pm Page 6 The Music Makers, Op. 69 Arthur O’Shaughnessy (1844–1881) the music. The starting-point for the cycle had been a song 1 Introduction – Moderato Of the land to which they are going: Much of the music of the third stanza has the composed in 1897, which set words by Elgar’s wife, and But on one man’s soul it hath broken, character of a stately processional.