Elgar: Songs & Piano Music [2 CDs]

Elgar: Songs & Piano Music [2 CDs] cover $35.00 Out of Stock
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EDWARD ELGAR
Elgar: Songs & Piano Music [2 CDs]
Amanda Pitt (soprano) Mark Wilde (tenor) Peter Savidge (baritone) David Owen Norris (1844 Broadwood Square Piano)

[ Avie / 2 CD ]

Release Date: Thursday 10 February 2011

This item is currently out of stock. It may take 6 or more weeks to obtain from when you place your order as this is a specialist product.

"A veritable treasure-trove."
(BBC Radio 3)

A tribute to Elgar's 150th birthday (2007), David Owen Norris and The Works perform Elgar's songs and piano solos on Elgar's own 1844 Broadwood piano, including the world-premiere of his unpublished final song XTC, set to his own words. In all, this 2-CD set presents 32 of Elgar's finest songs for voice and piano, including a number never recorded before, and premiere recordings of Elgar's piano arrangements of the theme of the Cello Concerto, and the Prelude and Angel's Farewell from Gerontius which, like Sea Pictures (sung here in its original soprano key) and the Woodland Interlude from Caractacus, were all composed at this piano. He even wrote these titles on its soundboard, along with his signature. These piano versions clearly remained in the forefront of Elgar's mind and reveal his bold first thoughts before they may have been revised at the suggestion of others. The piano's construction - keys slightly narrower than on a modern piano, the black keys set lower - illuminates Elgar's intentions. The writing suddenly makes perfect sense, which it doesn't always on a modern Steinway.

The cover art is H.A. Payne's The Enchanted Sea, which was part of the inspiration for Sea Pictures.

Tracks:

Seven Lieder
A War Song (Hayward), Op. 5
Is she not passing fair
As I laye a-thynkynge (Ingoldsby) (premiere recording)
Salut d'amour, Op. 12
The wind at dawn
After (P.B.Marston) Op. 31, No. 1
Woodland Interlude from Caractacus
Dry those fair, those crystal eyes (H.King)
The Pipes of Pan
Sea Pictures, Op. 37 (Elgar's own piano version)
Softly and gently, dearly-ransomed soul 'Angel's Farewell' (from The Dream of Gerontius) (Elgar's own piano version)
The Dream of Gerontius, Op. 38 - Prelude (Elgar's own piano version)
Come, Gentle Night (C.Bingham)
In the Dawn, Op. 41, No. 1
Speak, Music, Op. 41, No. 2
Dream Children, Op. 43
Arabian serenade
Canto Popolare (In Moonlight
Pleading, Op. 48 No. 1
Twilight, Op. 59 No. 1
Fringes of the Fleet
"?" (March 1918)
It isnae me (S.Holmes)
XTC (unpublished, to Elgar's own words)