Auld Lang Syne

Elgar: Enigma Variations - Harty/Hallé Orchestra

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• published: 28 Nov 2011
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Recorded in 1932. Thanks to Frank Martin for allowing me to use his excellent transfers. Thanks also to Bryan Crimp who made a very substantial number of 'edits'. You can find this and many other wonderful selections and information at his website: http://musicparlourhistorical.blogspot.com Sir (Herbert) Hamilton Harty (1879 - 1941) was an Irish and British composer, conductor, pianist and organist. In his capacity as a conductor, he was particularly noted as an interpreter of the music of Berlioz and he was much respected as a piano accompanist of exceptional prowess. Harty still stands as one of the most significant musicians that Northern Ireland has ever produced. Harty was born in Hillsborough, Ireland. Harty played viola, piano, and organ as a child. Initially following in his father's footsteps, he held positions as a church organist from age twelve. He moved to London in 1901 to pursue a musical career as accompanist, and accompanied an impressive list of soloists, among them John McCormack, W.H. Squire, Joseph Szigeti, Fritz Kreisler, and soprano Agnes Nicholls, whom he married on 15 July 1904. Nicholls' professional relationship with the Hungarian conductor Hans Richter was of great importance to Harty. After performing in Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen under Richter in 1908, she approached him on her husband's behalf. It was through this connection that Harty secured his first important conducting engagement. His reputation as a conductor grew, and he was invited to perform Wagner's Tristan und Isolde and Bizet's Carmen at Covent Garden in 1913. But he had little sympathy with opera, preferring symphonic music instead. In January 1914 he conducted the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, and in April he made his début with the Hallé Orchestra of Manchester. His career was interrupted briefly by the First World War. After short stints with the London Symphony Orchestra and elsewhere in England, Harty became permanent conductor of the Hallé Orchestra in 1920, a position that he held until 1933. Under his baton, the Hallé became one of the premier orchestras in England. He was knighted in 1925. From 1931 to 1936, Harty toured in America and elsewhere, conducting in Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Rochester, and Sydney. Harty's health began to deteriorate sharply in 1936: a malignant brain tumour was discovered and surgery was required. After both the growth and his right eye were removed, He conducted for the last time on 1 December 1940. Because of Harty's estrangement from his wife, the conductor was nursed through his final illness by his secretary and intimate friend, Olive Elfreda Baguley. Harty died in Hove; after cremation his ashes were placed in Hillsborough parish church. Notes on the Enigma Vaiations by David Nelson The Enigma Variations started as a way for Elgar to entertain his wife. One night in 1898, the composer was improvising melodies at the piano. Alice liked one of these and asked her husband to play it again. Not only did Elgar repeat the music, but he then spontaneously created variations on that theme in different styles that reminded them of different friends. Sometimes profound works of art have simple beginnings. Elgar obviously liked what he had started and expanded the little "portraits" into the piece performed tonight. He dedicated the work "to my friends pictured within" and even included the initials of his "subjects" in the name of each variation. Just some of the musical caricatures include the excited voice inflections of an actor (Variation III), an amateur violinist who had trouble crossing strings (Variation VI), the house of a music lover (Variation VIII), and the bulldog of one of his friends as it jumps into a river (Variation XI). The most intriguing aspect of the Enigma Variations is that Elgar wrote that there was a hidden theme in the work that is "not played". Just what was meant by this has been fodder for scholars to debate for more than a century. Some think that the mysterious music is "Auld Lang Syne", but the composer ruled this out. "Rule Brittania" is another possibility, and many have supported this idea over the years. It may be Mozart's "Prague" Symphony, which shared the concert when the Enigma Variations were first performed in 1899. And others feel that the "Enigma melody" is really an accompaniment to some other tune. Personally, I support those who say that the "solution" to this enigma is better left unknown.