arranged for piano and orchestra by Iain Farrington

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Elgar - Concert Allegro (10'41")

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Elgar - Concert Allegro

In 1901, Elgar was asked by the pianist Fanny Davies to compose a ‘wee little Elgar’ for a forthcoming recital. The resulting work was a large-scale solo piece, full of brilliant virtuoso piano writing and broad lyrical melodies. Elgar gave it his opus 41, following on from the ‘Cockaigne’ Overture, with which the Allegro shares many features. It had a mixed reception at its premiere, and Elgar took back the manuscript for revision. Neither Novello nor Schott would publish the work, and Elgar probably never returned to the piece. He gave the score away, and it was only rediscovered in 1968.

The revision shows many bars crossed out, and some small additions. Most notably, the title page is altered to ‘for pianoforte + orchestra’, and throughout the manuscript are markings for ‘pf’ and ‘orch.’ Clearly Elgar toyed with the idea of making the work into a mini concerto, but like the Piano Concerto, he never finished the job. This arrangement for piano and orchestra incorporates Elgar’s original piano piece with a new orchestral role. As the work is complete, the process was one of orchestrating those passages marked by Elgar in a satisfactory manner, and making a suitable accompaniment to the original piano part. Virtually no composition or reorganisation of material was required.

Duration: 10½  minutes

Parts available on request