Elgar: Symphony No 2

Advantages: It is simply one of the finest pieces of music ever written
Disadvantages: How dare you ask of any disadvantges!?!

...Recordings of the Century series, which includes the classic pairing of the concerto with Dame Janet Baker's classic version of Elgar's song cycle "Sea Pictures", and a new addition of the Cockaigne Overture. Original album EMI Classics (5 56219 2); EMI Great Recordings (5 62886 2) However, if clean recording quality of the "DDD" variety is what you are after, the best new recording would undoubtedly be Yo-Yo Ma's recording with Andre Previn conducting again the London Symphony for Sony. The recorded sound and performances are first rate, with Ma being very passionate about everything, showing his great technical prowess, and makes for a great addition to your collection, even if it doesn't quite overturn DuPré's account. CBS Masterworks (39541) For those interested in history there is of course Elgar's own recording from 1928 with Beatrice... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful

Advantages: Good show, hurrah for the British Empire!
Disadvantages: Hum, humph...

...EVENING AT THE CLUB Outside of his concertos, symphonies and choral music, I suppose none of Sir Edward Elgar's works are as well remembered by the general populus than his marches. Though they can't really be called "important" works, they do have a distinct air of stereotypical British pompousness about them that defines the English Imperialism and sense of brash importance on the rage before the First World War. As regards Elgar, these considerations are also often mixed with the thoughts of a refined country gentleman that Elgar's personality ironically seems to enbody despite being born as the son of a shopkeeper, a profession that was considered almost impossible to escape. As such I think Elgar has more than earned to be called a "counter-jumper", which is applied to those who have managed to escape this background. And if... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful

Advantages: Committed performance, spacious recording, low price
Disadvantages: None

...wanted to respect the composer's dying wish not to allow anyone to "tinker" with his symphony. However, in 1995, realising that in ten years time the copyright on the sketches would expire, the family commissioned Anthony Payne, a composer, musicologist and Elgar enthusiast, to use the sketches to construct the symphony Elgar might have written. Payne worked with intensity and excitement, piecing together the "jigsaw" fragments and filling in where necessary. The completed work, described as "The Sketches for Symphony no.3 elaborated by Anthony Payne" was performed for the first time in public in February 1998 by the BBC Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Andrew Davis to massive critical acclaim. These same forces had recorded the work two months earlier for the NMC label and the recording was released later in 1998. The work... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful