Sibelius’ Violin and Elgar’s Enigma Program Notes

Benjamin Britten’s Variations and Fugue on a Theme of Purcell (Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra) 

World Premiere October 15, 1946; Liverpool, England 
18 Minutes   

Benjamin Britten is celebrated for his operas and other vocal works. 
He lived in the U.S. from 1939 to 1942, a conscientious objector to the war. 
With his life partner, the tenor Peter Pears, he founded the Aldeburgh Festival in 1948. 
His War Requiem (1963) was the first Requiem to combine poetry with sacred text.

Throughout the 19th century, Germans called England Das Land ohne Musik, “the land without music,” because England seemed bereft of native talent. It thrived on imported talent from its Teutonic cousins on the continent. George Frideric Handel, Johann Christian Bach, Joseph Haydn and Felix Mendelssohn are just a few of the Europeans who found a warm welcome in Britain. Toward the end of the 19th century, however, Britain underwent one of the greatest cultural renaissances of modern times, one that flourished throughout the 20th century and continues today.  

Perhaps more than any other British composer, Benjamin Britten put England back on the musical map as a major force in music. He represents the culmination of a wonderful group of composers including Edward Elgar, Ralph Vaughan Williams, William Walton and Michael Tippett, whose compositions have continued to enrich the repertoire.   

Britten is best known for his stage and choral works, but he was a marvelous composer of instrumental music as well. The Variations and Fugue on a Theme of Purcell dates from 1946, the year after his triumphant opera Peter Grimes. The piece is equally well known by its subtitle: Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra. 

Britten’s theme is based on the hornpipe, a popular 16th– and 17th-century dance related to the jig. This one is from Henry Purcell’s Abdelazer, instrumental music composed for a 1695 play. Britten opens with full orchestra, followed by episodes introducing the four families of instruments: woodwinds, brass, strings (with harp) and percussion.  

The variations feature each instrument of the orchestra, sometimes in pairs, elsewhere for the entire section. Always, the balance of the orchestra supports the spotlighted players, demonstrating the broad teamwork inherent to a symphony orchestra. The variations are quite short, focusing on specific aspects of each instrument’s character, timbre and flexibility. He concludes the work with a brilliant fugue with each instrument joining in the same order as they appeared in the preceding variations.  

Jean Sibelius’ Violin Concerto in D minor, Op. 47  

World Premiere February 8, 1904; Helsinki, Finland 
35 Minutes   

Richard Wagner, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky and Ferruccio Busoni were Jean Sibelius’ principal influences. 
His early tone poem Finlandia is an overtly nationalist work, protesting Russian rule. 
He grew up speaking Swedish but also spoke Finnish and other languages. 
Sibelius’ symphonic poems draw heavily on the national literary epic, Kalevala.

The name of Jean Sibelius is inextricably linked with his homeland. Through his seven symphonies and numerous symphonic poems, notably The Swan of Tuonela and Finlandia, he established a school of Finnish music that remains among the most important manifestations of nationalism. His impact and influence on others have been equally far-ranging, particularly among Scandinavian and British composers. More than two decades into the 21st century, Sibelius remains Finland’s most celebrated composer.  

Ask a young violinist what their favorite concerto is, and the reply will almost certainly come without hesitation: “Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky.” If you pose the same question to a seasoned professional, the answer is more likely to be: “Jean Sibelius: I feel like it was written just for me.” Violinists love the Sibelius Violin Concerto. Perhaps they relate to it because Sibelius played violin and understood the instrument. He plumbed every aspect of its expressive and technical capabilities in the concerto.  

Sibelius’ fusion of Nordic ice and midsummer fire have made this work a perennial audience favorite as well. He establishes a brooding character with the violin’s first note, sweetly lyrical yet dissonant, above the orchestra’s string tremolando. The soloist spins a spellbinding tale amid the full ensemble. The expanded first movement cadenza follows Felix Mendelssohn’s model, taking the place of a development section.  

Sibelius’ Adagio di molto is a three-part romance with a dramatic middle section. In the reprise, violin provides delicate embroidery. Energy and dance rhythms drive the finale, whose highlights include a dazzling section in harmonics. 

Edward Elgar’s Enigma Variations, Op. 36 

World Premiere June 19, 1899; London, England 
31 Minutes   

Edward Elgar helped to put England back on the international, musical map. 
A devout Catholic, he encountered considerable prejudice in Anglican England. 
His wife, Caroline Alice Roberts, was a poet and novelist. 
His most popular works are the Pomp and Circumstance marches we hear at graduations.

A quintessentially English piece, Edward Elgar’s iconic Enigma Variations was a significant milestone in reestablishing Britain as a major musical center at the turn of the 20th century. Elgar’s music is both personal and autobiographical. Each of the 14 variations is titled either with a monogram or a nickname that identifies one of the composer’s friends. Thus, “C.A.E.” of the first variation is the composer’s wife, Caroline Alice Elgar; Variation II’s “H.D.S.-P.” is Hew David Steuart-Powell, the pianist in Elgar’s trio; along with “B.G.N.,” Basil Nevinson, the cellist and subject of Variation XII and so forth. Many of their circle in Worcestershire achieved thereby a measure of immortality in Elgar’s piece. It is clear that Elgar took delight in expressing his friends’ personalities in musical terms. They inspired him to compose a masterpiece, one that heralded the arrival of England’s first great symphonist. 

The work’s emotional center is the “Nimrod” variation, devoted to August Jaeger, Elgar’s advocate at the London music publishing house of Novello (Jaeger means hunter in German; the reference is Biblical). “Nimrod” is said to have been inspired by an evening walk during which Jaeger spoke poetically about Ludwig van Beethoven’s slow movements. Surely, it is no accident that Elgar placed this variation in E-flat major, Beethoven’s heroic key. Many listeners have also perceived a strong similarity between the “Nimrod” variation’s opening theme and that of the famous slow movement to Beethoven’s “Pathétique” Sonata, Op. 13. 

Elgar never revealed the meaning of his subtitle. Guesses range from “God Save the King” and “Auld Lang Syne” to “Ta-ra-ra Boom-de-ay,” “Home Sweet Home” and Martin Luther’s chorale “A Mighty Fortress is our God.” No definitive solution has been universally accepted, and the secret of the Enigma Variations remains one of music’s tantalizing mysteries.  

Variations and Fugue on a Theme of Purcell (Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra)

Benjamin Britten

Born November 22, 1913, in Lowestoft, Suffolk, England · Died December 4, 1976, in Aldeburgh, England

Throughout the 19th century, Germans called England Das Land ohne Musik, “the land without music,” because England seemed bereft of native talent. It thrived on imported talent from its Teutonic cousins on the continent: George Frideric Handel, Johann Christian Bach, Joseph Haydn and Felix Mendelssohn are just a few of the Europeans who found a warm welcome in Britain. Toward the end of the 19th century, however, Britain underwent one of the greatest cultural renaissances of modern times, one that flourished throughout the 20th century and continues today.

Perhaps more than any other British composer, Britten put England back on the musical map as a major force in music. He represents the culmination of a wonderful group of composers including Edward Elgar, Ralph Vaughan Williams, William Walton and Michael Tippett, whose compositions have continued to enrich the repertoire.

The more traditional title, Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra, bears tribute to Britten’s musical heritage in much the same way that Maurice Ravel’s Tombeau de Couperin is a salute to French tradition. Henry Purcell (1659-1695) was the greatest English composer of the Baroque period. Some would hold that he was the greatest until Britten. As Britten’s biographer Imogen Holst has written:

He owed more to Purcell than to any other composer, and he always went on learning from his music, not only from what he described as the ‘clarity, brilliance, tenderness and strangeness’ of [Purcell’s] songs but also from the vitality of the instrumental pieces.

That vitality transfers splendidly into these Variations and Fugue. While the narrated version is associated with the young, Britten’s music holds a rare appeal for listeners of all ages. Britten’s organizational structure is clear enough to be easily perceptible. The work functions well as an abstract musical composition. Throughout the piece, the balance of the orchestra supports the spotlighted players, demonstrating the broad teamwork inherent to a symphony orchestra. The variations are quite short, focusing on specific aspects of each instrument’s character, timbre and flexibility.

Having taken the full ensemble apart and examined each of its components, Britten concludes his little pedagogic masterpiece in an appropriately academic manner. He reassembles the orchestra in a brilliant fugue, which is itself yet another variation on Purcell’s adaptable theme. The instruments take their turn with the fugue subject in the same order that they were introduced in the preceding variations. As Peter Evans has written:

Though the harmonic language is humdrum and the figurations parody Baroque formulae, the sheer verve with which so much activity is sustained in this fugue commands the kind of breathless admiration with which we reward a juggler.

Instrumentation: The score calls for piccolo, two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion (xylophone, triangle snare drum, cymbals, bass drum, tambourine, gong, whip, castanets and Chinese block), harp and strings.

Violin Concerto in D minor, Op. 47

Jean Sibelius

Born December 8, 1865, in Hämeenlinna (Tavastehus), Finland · Died September 20, 1957, in Järvenpää, Finland

Nationalist beacon: the legacy of Sibelius

Sibelius’ Violin Concerto is something of an anomaly. We remember him for his symphonic legacy. The concerto is the only work by Sibelius for a solo instrument plus orchestra that has entered the repertory. How do we account for the existence of this popular work, which is so unlike anything else written by its composer?

Sibelius showed little affinity for the piano as a child, but his obvious aptitude for violin manifested itself clearly. Although he undertook violin lessons too late to consider a career as a performing virtuoso, his natural gift for the instrument found a happy outlet in the rarely heard Humoresques and this Violin Concerto.

Conundrum: virtuoso vehicle vs. coherent symphonic composition

The piece was originally intended for the eminent German violinist Willy Burmester, but once Sibelius completed it in 1903, he chose not to wait for Burmester’s next tour to Finland in order to introduce the new composition. Victor Novacek played the first performance in Helsinki in February 1904, under the composer’s baton. A critical review from the powerful Finnish critic Karl Flodin caused Sibelius to withdraw the concerto for extensive revisions. The following year, in a revised version, the concerto made its debut in Berlin. This time, the soloist was Karl Halir, violinist of the Joachim Quartet, and the conductor was the celebrated German composer Richard Strauss. Sibelius wrote:

In October 1905, my violin concerto, in its revised and final form, stood its baptism of fire in Germany at a concert in the Singakademie in Berlin. The solo part was conducted by none other than Richard Strauss. As an instance of Strauss’ extraordinary conscientiousness in performing the works of other contemporary composers, it should be mentioned that he had three rehearsals with the orchestra for practicing the accompaniment. But the violin concerto requires it.

The challenge that Sibelius faced was to create a virtuoso vehicle that would also meet his own high standards and adhere, at least generally, to the formal guidelines expected of a major symphonic composition. Sibelius avoided the formal experiments of his orchestral works. The form of the concerto is fairly conventional: three movements arranged fast-slow-fast.

Affinity for the fiddle

The orchestra has a subordinate role, generally ceding the spotlight to the soloist. Sibelius wrote gratefully for violin. He understood the instrument from the inside out through his own extensive study. Equally important, he understood the technique of his intended first soloist, whose formidable command of the instrument we hear in the lengthy solo cadenza.

Sibelius is little known as a composer of songs, probably because of language difficulties outside his native Finland. His vocal gift finds an instrumental outlet in the intense and emotionally evocative Adagio that constitutes the concerto’s slow movement. The finale, a pulsing hybrid of polonaise and rondo with some nomadic flavor thrown in for additional color, is a thriller: rhythmically vibrant and brilliantly virtuosic without being acrobatic.

Instrumentation: The concerto is scored for woodwinds and trumpets in pairs, four horns, three trombones, timpani, violin solo and strings.

***Enigma Variations*, Op. 36**

Edward Elgar

Born June 2, 1857, in Broadheath, near Worcester, England · Died February 23, 1934, in Worcester, England

Edward Elgar was the catalyst for a major renaissance in English composition that took place at the turn of the 20^th century. His Enigma Variations, composed in 1898 and 1899, catapulted him to fame both in his own country and on the continent. It remains his best-known composition.

The inner page of this remarkable score bears the inscription, “Dedicated to my friends pictured within.” Over the first page, the word “Enigma” appears. Each of the 14 variations is titled either with a monogram or a nickname that identifies one of the composer’s friends. Thus, “C.A.E.” of the first variation is the composer’s wife, Caroline Alice Elgar; Variation II’s “H.D.S.-P.” is Hew David Steuart-Powell, pianist in Elgar’s trio (along with “B.G.N.,” Basil Nevinson, the cellist and subject of Variation XII) and so forth. Many of their circle in Worcestershire achieved thereby a measure of immortality in Elgar’s piece.

It is clear that Elgar took delight in expressing his friends’ personalities in musical terms. To his friend August Johannes Jaeger, he wrote in October 1898:

Since I’ve been back, I have sketched a set of Variations on an original theme; the Variations have amused me because I’ve labelled ’em with the nicknames of my particular friends—you are Nimrod [“Jaeger” means hunter in German; Elgar’s reference is to Nimrod, the mighty hunter in the Bible]. That is to say I’ve written the Variations each one to represent the mood of the ‘party.’

Jaeger was also Elgar’s advocate at the London music publishing house of Novello and did much to promote Elgar’s music and encourage his friend. Elgar returned the support by making Jaeger’s the central variation of the set, the pivotal slow movement with the greatest emotional impact. “Nimrod” is said to have been inspired by an evening walk during which Jaeger spoke poetically about Beethoven’s slow movements. Surely, it is no accident that Elgar placed this variation in E-flat major, Beethoven’s heroic key. Many listeners have also perceived a strong similarity between the “Nimrod” variation’s opening theme and that of the famous slow movement to Beethoven’s “Pathétique” Sonata, Op. 13.

Elgar never revealed the meaning of his subtitle, writing:

The enigma I will not explain—its “dark saying” must be left unguessed, and I warn you that the apparent connection between the variations and the theme is often of the slightest texture; further, through and over the whole set another and larger theme “goes” but is not played.

That stated, this musical portrait gallery is a treasure trove of brilliant character sketches, belying Elgar’s insistence that Enigma was absolute music, independent of those who had inspired it. William Meath Baker, the “W.M.B.” of Variation IV, is said to have been a decisive, athletic man who went about life with great physical flourishes punctuating his activities. His variation is appropriately resolute. Isabel Fitton, the “Ysobel” of Variation VI, was a viola student of Elgar’s; her lyrical, gentle variation features a viola solo and allegedly satirizes technical problems in her string playing that she never overcame.

Contemporaries described Arthur Troyte Griffith (“Troyte,” Variation VII) as an argumentative type. Elgar paints him with vigorous timpani, then brasses in animated dialogue with rapid violin triplets. This is a true virtuoso variation, enough to convince us that Troyte was a formidable opponent in debate!

“Dorabella” (Variation X) was Elgar’s pet name for Dora Penny, the youngest member of his circle included in the Enigma Variations. Her variation has the airy delicacy of ballet music. Sprightly, chirping fillips of woodwinds and strings in “Dorabella” invite choreography; it comes as no surprise that Frederick Ashton created a ballet from Elgar’s piece in 1968.

Technically, what makes the Enigma Variations so marvelous is a combination of splendid orchestration, careful gauging of key changes and brilliant transitions from one variation to the next. Spiritually, what binds it is the overriding affection Elgar had for his friends. Variation XIV, “E.D.U.” (Alice’s pet name for her husband was “Edu”) binds the set together in exuberant conclusion, as if to say, “Lucky me, that my life is enriched by these wonderful people.” Whether heard as an independent piece of music or in the context of Elgar’s musical portrait gallery, the Enigma Variations is one of the greatest masterpieces of classical repertoire and Elgar’s finest composition.

Instrumentation: Elgar’s Enigma Variations are scored for a large orchestra of two flutes (second doubling piccolo), two clarinets, two bassoons, contrabassoon, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones (third doubling tuba), timpani, percussion, organ ad lib. and strings.