The BBC Orchestra
(Section B)
Leader, Paul Beard
Conductor, Sir Adrian Boult
Written early in 1910 as a loyal tribute to King Edward VII, Elgar's Second Symphony was afterwards dedicated to his memory. It is prefaced by the first two lines of Shelley's poem: ' Rarely, rarely, comest thou, Spirit of Delight ', and though Elgar's music has no intention of following the whole poem closely, it is no doubt born of the idea set forth in these two lines.
Arnold Bax describes his tone poem ' Tintagel ' as follows: 'This work is only in the broadest sense programme music. The composer's intention is simply to offer a tonal impression of the castle-crowned cliff of (now sadly degenerate) Tintagel, and more especially of the long distances of the Atlantic, as seen from the cliffs of Cornwall on a sunny but not windless summer day. The literary and traditional associations of the scene also enter into the scheme. The music opens, after a few introductory bars, with a theme, given out on the brass, which may be taken as representing the ruined castle, now so ancient and weather-worn as to seem an emanation of the rock upon which it is built. The subject is worked to a broad diatonic climax and is followed by a long melody for strings, which may suggest the serene and almost limitless spaces of the ocean.'