Elgar - Enigma Varations

Elgar - Enigma Varations

At the time of British composer Edward Elgar’s birth (1857-1934), Great Britain was without a composer of international repute since Henry Purcell died in 1695. Although London was a musical mecca, this had little to do with the British themselves. Rather, French, Italian, and German composers such as George Frideric Handel (1685-1759) settled in London to make a name for themselves on the international stage. At the end of the 19th century, Johannes Brahms (1833-1897) and Antonín Dvořák (1841-1904) moved to Great Britain. The influence of Brahms, and Dvořák in particular, is evidenced in the works Edward Elgar premiered in 1899 - his Enigma Variations are based on Dvořák's Symphonic Variations (1877) and the opening of Brahms' Symphony No. 4. The Enigma Variations are a series of musical portraits, depicting their subjects on various levels, as was commonplace in paintings of the time. In addition to general musical impression of subjects, specific character traits are marked, with each variation based on a friend of the composer.