Jeffrey Tate's
Elgar is not for most people because, for most people,
Elgar is the musical equivalent of
Rudyard Kipling: an imperialist composer who made music of the English Empire at the height of its pomp and power, a majestic composer whose two symphonies are grandiose monuments to noble ambition and righteous aspirations, a glorious composer whose melodies are hymns, whose rhythms are marches, whose colors are resplendent, and whose purpose in life was to preach the gospel of English imperialism.
For
Jeffrey Tate,
Elgar was a passionate and private composer, a composer whose music is full of doubt as well as confidence and whose two symphonies are deeply felt and intimately emotional works that have little or nothing to do with imperial England. As embodied in these two recordings with the
London Symphony from 1991 and 1992,
Tate's
Elgar is massively impressive and personally anguished. In
Tate's interpretation of the Symphony No. 1,
Elgar's initial nobilmente e semplice theme is battered in the opening Allegro, bruised in the Allegro molto, beaten in the Adagio, and at last raised, tattered, and torn, to float above the final pages of the closing Allegro. In
Tate's interpretation of the Symphony No. 2,
Elgar's opening Allegro vivace e nobilmente is followed by a profound and pensive Larghetto, then by a pounding and pummeling Presto, and finally by a mellow and melancholy Moderato e maestoso. While
Tate's conducting is a bit ragged and the
LSO's playing is a bit tatty, the humanity of their performance makes a compelling case for
Elgar's own humanity. And for listeners who have long believed that beneath the imperial exterior beat a human heart, this is good news indeed. EMI's early digital sound is very, very loud.