An Elgar Song Album - Medium Voice And Piano

Elgar was pre-eminently the composer of large forms. Complex, lengthy development of musical ideas was for him a measure of genius. His songs, with the exception of the orchestral cycle Sea Pictures, were not often thevehicles for his most striking ideas. Paradoxically, he was also bedevilled by a fine literally taste. He once told a friend that he felt it better to set the best second-rate poetry to music, for the most immortal verse ismusic already. Some of his songs are therefore settings of poets now all but forgotten, such as Arthur Salmon and Gilbert Parker: to their verse his music might make a vital addition. Elgar's songs offer authenticEdwardianreflections which we can value now in their own terms. These songs are full of echoes of a master's thoughts - and especially in the songs written for the stage - flashes of his genius.

CONTENTS

• Deck The Halls
• In Dulci Jubilo
• O Holy Night
• God rest ye merry, gentlemen (duet)
• Silent Night
• Hallelujah!
• Ding dong! merrily on high (duet)
• We Wish You A Merry Christmas
• Ring Out The Bells
• A jingle bell jazz
• We three kings (duet)
• What Child Is This?
• Toyland
• Joy To The World (Duet)