Elgar: The Dream of Gerontius

Featuring

Martyn Brabbins
David Butt Philip
Karen Cargill
Roland Wood
Orchestra of Opera North
Huddersfield Choral Society

Royal Northern College of Music Chamber Choir
Edward Elgar

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Composition History

Elgar's "The Dream of Gerontius" was commissioned by the 1900 Birmingham Festival, and he refused to call it an oratorio or cantata.

Recording & Production

The Huddersfield Choral Society made the first-ever complete recording of "The Dream of Gerontius" in April 1945 with the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra.

Composition History

Elgar's editor, August Jaeger, persuaded him to add the climactic moment where Gerontius's soul meets God, initially omitted by Elgar, by telling him, "You are no Wagner!"

Composer Biography

Edward Elgar was raised Catholic, as his mother converted five years before his birth, and his father, William, also converted on his deathbed.

Compositional Technique

Elgar's "The Dream of Gerontius" utilizes a Wagnerian music-drama style, incorporating a complex network of leitmotifs and a virtuoso orchestral technique.

Critical Reception

Despite a disastrous premiere performance, critics almost universally praised "The Dream of Gerontius," with The Musical Times calling it "a work of great originality, beauty and power."

Notable Performances

Richard Strauss famously declared Elgar "the first English progressivist" after a successful performance of "The Dream of Gerontius" in Düsseldorf, Germany, in 1902.