The Lord hath chosen them to stand before Him, to serve Him.—II. Chron. 29, 11.
He hath chosen the weak to confound the mighty.—I. Cor. 1, 27.
He will direct their work in truth.—Isa. 61, 8.
Behold, God exalteth by His power: who teacheth like Him?—Job 36, 22.
The meek will He guide in judgment, and the meek will He teach His way.—Ps. 25, 9.
He will direct their work in truth.—Isa. 61, 8.
For out of Zion shall go forth the law.—Isa. 2, 3.
"You will notice that occasionally, as in the third extract, I have used the words in their meaning that appears on the surface, and not in the real meaning of the sentence which may be found in any commentary. To keep the diction exactly the same I have not gone outside the Scripture except in one sentence from the Talmud in the case of the watchers on the Temple roof.
"It was part of my original scheme to continue 'The Apostles' by a second work carrying on the establishment of the Church among the Gentiles. This, too, is to be followed by a third oratorio, in which the fruit of the whole—that is to say, the end of the world and the Judgment—is to be exemplified. I, however, faltered at that idea, and I suggested to the directors of the Birmingham Festival to add merely a short third part to the two into which the already published work, 'The Apostles,' is divided. But I found that to be unsatisfactory, and I have decided to revert to my original lines. There will, therefore, be two other oratorios."
This definite pronouncement of Dr. Elgar's cannot fail to evoke the warmest anticipations on the part of the music loving world.
It is worth noting here that shortly after "The Dream of Gerontius" was produced at the Birmingham Festival, in 1900, Herr Julius Buths, the famous conductor of Düsseldorf, was so struck with it that he determined to produce it in Germany and himself translated the libretto. So great a success was this performance that "The Dream," which one of the most celebrated German musical critics has declared to be "the greatest composition of the last hundred years, with the exception of the 'Requiem' of Brahms," was repeated at the Lower Rhine Festival, a thing hitherto unheard of in the annals of English music, and at the Lower Rhine Festival on Whit-Sunday "The Apostles" is to be given.
Dr. Elgar has a delightful and most acute sense of humour, so that I was sure I should not be misunderstood if I ventured to ask a question about his "musical crimes."
He smiled. "But which of my musical crimes do you mean? From the point of view of one person or another I understand all my music has been a crime," he replied, lightly. Then he added, "Oh, you mean 'The Cockaigne,' 'The Coronation Ode,' and 'The Imperial March' especially. Yes, I believe there are a good many people who have objected to them. But I like to look on the composer's vocation as the old troubadours or bards did. In those days it was no disgrace to a man to be turned on to step in front of an army and inspire the people with a song. For my own part, I know that there are a lot of people who like to celebrate events with music. To these people I have given tunes. Is that wrong? Why should I write a fugue or something which won't appeal to anyone, when the people yearn for things which can stir them—"
"Such as 'Pomp and Circumstance,'" I interpolated.
"Ah, I don't know anything about that," replied Dr. Elgar, "but I do know we are a nation with great military proclivities, and I did not see why the ordinary quick march should not be treated on a large scale in the way that the waltz, the old-fashioned slow march, and even the polka have been treated by the great composers; yet all marches on the symphonic scale are so slow that people can't march to them. I have some of the soldier instinct in me, and so I have written two marches of which, so far from being ashamed, I am proud. 'Pomp and Circumstance,' by the way, is merely the generic name for what is a set of six marches. Two, as you know, have already appeared, and the others will come later. One of them is to be a Soldier's Funeral March.
