It is amazing that two classics in English orchestral music were composed within the short space of some fifteen years around the turn of the previous century.
Edward Elgar’s ‘Enigma Variations’ have fascinated listeners since the first performance in 1899. In 14 remarkably diverse variations Elgar demonstrates his compositional mastery while creating miniature portraits of his closest friends, as well as of his wife and himself. By turns gentle, idyllic, and boisterous, the pieces which often run seamlessly into each other nevertheless make up a coherent whole, like a group portrait taken during a country weekend.
In 1916 Gustav Holst completed another set of musical character sketches his suite ‘The Planets’, in seven movements. These have little to do with astronomy and even less with the Roman deities whose names they carry. Holst was rather inspired by astrology and the suite actually concerns human character as influenced by the planets.
Performing the program in the warm acoustics of Bergen’s Grieg Hall, the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra under Andrew Litton give it their all in this musical spectacular.
Here is a section of the Enigma Variations:
