Variations on an Original Theme “Enigma”, Op. 36

1. 0:00
   Opening of the theme, first violins

   Only the strings play. The first violins enter after a crotchet rest with two short notes and two longer ones, and the next bar reverses the order. The theme is in G minor.

2. 1:10
   Evening of 21 October 1898

   On 21 October 1898, after a day’s teaching, Elgar sat down at the piano and played a tune that caught Alice’s attention. He began trying out versions of it as their friends might play them. The evening’s amusement became fourteen variations.

3. 1:32
   Variation I, “C.A.E.”

   The portrait of Caroline Alice Elgar keeps the tempo of the theme, marked L’istesso tempo. Oboes and bassoons play the melody in octaves in G minor. Around them the first violins play running notes and the cellos are divided.

4. 2:25
   Alice’s practical support

   Alice, a general’s daughter, married the music teacher in 1889 against her relatives’ wishes. Her support took practical forms. She ruled bar lines on her husband’s score paper and walked miles in all weathers to post manuscripts and proofs.

5. 2:52
   Closing bars of Variation I

   The brass drops out and the strings slow. In the closing bars the violins play a last ascending run. The strings end on a chord of G major, marked ppp, under a fermata.

Joins

1. 1:32
   From the theme into Variation I

   The marking L’istesso tempo keeps the pulse unchanged. Oboes and bassoons play the G minor melody together, marked largamente, over running figures in the first violins and cellos. The basses play pizzicato beneath them, and the second violins stay muted.

2. 2:14
   The violins leap upwards

   The second violins remove their mutes. The first violins leap into their high register, marked largamente, and descend in a long run. The horns hold their notes. The basses return after a rest, and the timpani roll beneath the phrase.

3. 2:52
   Close of Variation I in G major

   The brass stops while the strings and woodwinds finish their phrases. Elgar marks a ritardando. A final violin run climbs above the divided violas and cellos, and the basses come back in on the final G major chord, held at ppp.

1. 0:00
   Staccato semiquavers, violins

   The first violins begin a staccato run, and the seconds take it up. Sharps and naturals crowd the short figures, which parody a pianist’s warm-up exercise. The woodwinds follow.

2. 0:22
   Piano trio partners of Elgar

   H.D.S.-P. played piano trios with Elgar on violin and Basil Nevinson on cello. Elgar gave each of them a variation. The pianist’s is this Allegro, and the cellist’s is the twelfth variation, which has a long cello solo.

1. 0:00
   Oboe solo with bassoons

   The solo oboe plays a varied form of the theme, marked scherzando. Bassoons reply below it over pizzicato strings.

2. 0:32
   Richard Baxter Townshend

   Townshend was an Oxford don and the author of the Tenderfoot books. Elgar recalled his amateur acting in the part of an old man whose low voice kept flying into soprano. His brother-in-law, William Meath Baker, is the subject of the next variation.

1. 0:00
   Variation IV, “W.M.B.”

   The marking is Allegro di molto. Strings and woodwinds play short, heavily accented phrases, with horns, trumpets and timpani behind them. The variation is brief and moves quickly to its last chord.

2. 0:13
   Baker’s carriage arrangements

   Baker had a house full of guests and carriages to arrange. He read out the day’s plans forcefully from a slip of paper, then hurried from the music room and banged the door by accident. Elgar put the guests’ teasing response in the middle of the variation.

1. 0:00
   Theme in C minor, lower strings

   Cellos and double basses play the theme in C minor, marked sostenuto. Around it the violins play a figure on the G string. In his commentary on the variation, Elgar linked the solemnity of the theme to Arnold’s conversation.

2. 0:35
   Arnold at the piano

   Arnold, son of the poet Matthew Arnold, taught himself the piano. Elgar enjoyed the way he got round the difficult passages while still conveying the music’s feeling. In his conversation, earnest talk kept breaking into whimsical remarks.

3. 1:38
   Link to Variation VI

   The woodwind figures stop. Short string figures continue over soft timpani and low brass and lead directly into Isabel Fitton’s portrait, Ysobel. Elgar marks attacca at the end of the page.

Joins

1. 0:32
   Flute and wind over C major

   The C minor bass melody comes to rest on C, and E♮ turns the harmony to C major. A solo flute runs upwards and oboes and clarinets exchange short phrases. The strings drop to pianissimo, and the Moderato tempo continues.

2. 1:38
   Low brass and attacca into “Ysobel”

   A falling solo clarinet run leads into the closing link. The strings play a small curling figure while the timpani hold a soft roll. Trombones and tuba enter pianissimo, and the double basses sustain their note beneath them. The page is marked attacca, and the music continues without a break into Ysobel.

1. 0:00
   Opening viola figure

   The violas’ opening figure dips low and leaps back up across the strings, and a long note follows the leap. Bassoons and clarinets play short fragments. The violas repeat the figure, which Elgar described as a string-crossing exercise in My Friends Pictured Within.

2. 0:30
   Isabel Fitton, viola pupil

   Isabel Fitton came from a musical family in Malvern and studied the viola with Elgar. From his teaching he knew that crossing from one string to another is a beginner’s difficulty. He built the Andantino of her portrait around that exercise.

1. 0:00
   Opening, timpani and low strings

   Timpani, cellos and double basses play a lopsided figure. Elgar writes one semibreve beat to each bar and marks the music Presto. The winds enter while the bass repeats its few notes.

2. 0:27
   Troyte Griffith and the piano lesson

   Troyte Griffith was a Malvern architect and one of Elgar’s closest friends. In Elgar’s account the variation depicts a piano lesson that gets steadily worse. The pupil blunders, the teacher tries to restore order and ends the lesson with a final slam. Elgar identified the teacher as himself.

1. 0:00
   Opening for two clarinets

   Two clarinets begin together over a softly moving cello line. The flutes enter next, then the violins. This Allegretto in G major, in 6/8, follows Troyte.

2. 0:35
   Winifred Norbury and Sherridge

   Winifred Norbury helped run the Worcestershire Philharmonic Society. Elgar took the manners and atmosphere of this variation from Sherridge, the eighteenth-century house she shared with her sister. Her initials stand above it because of her connection with his musical life, and her distinctive laugh is written into the music.

1. 0:00
   Adagio, first violins on the D string

   The first violins play ppp on the D string. Divided violas and second violins fill in the chords beneath them, over a quiet bass. The Adagio is in 3/4, and the melody runs across the bar lines as a single long phrase.

2. 0:31
   August Jaeger and the name Nimrod

   August Jaeger worked for Novello, Elgar’s publisher. He read the scores closely, praised them, argued with their composer and sometimes demanded changes. His surname means hunter in German, and Elgar named the variation after Nimrod, the mighty hunter of the Book of Genesis.

3. 1:05
   Jaeger and the “Pathétique” Sonata

   In 1904 Elgar told Dora Penny how Jaeger had talked him out of giving up composition. Jaeger pointed to Beethoven’s troubles, sang the slow movement of the “Pathétique” Sonata and said: “And that is what you must do.” The opening of Nimrod contains a hint of that melody.

4. 1:32
   Full orchestra, legatissimo

   Elgar marks the passage legatissimo, with the notes joined as closely as possible. The woodwinds double the rising violin tune and the brass fill in the chords. Timpani reinforce the bass.

Joins

1. 0:32
   Winds join the strings

   The E♭ major Adagio continues. Flute and clarinet share the violin melody, with bassoons and horns filling the chords below. The cellos divide, and the basses move under the rising phrase. A new crescendo grows from pianissimo; the three-beat pace stays unchanged.

2. 1:32
   Wind phrases to full-orchestra legatissimo

   Oboe and clarinet play quiet phrases above a rising cello line. Bassoons and horns join the crescendo, then the E♭ major melody is played legatissimo. Timpani and double basses play beneath it; trumpets, trombones and tuba fill out the sustained chords.

3. 2:36
   Final ritardando and E♭ major chord

   At the final ritardando the violin line descends and the orchestra drops from fortissimo to pianissimo. Brass and timpani stop. Clarinets, bassoons and strings hold the last E♭ major chord over a low E♭, with a pause above the final bar.

1. 0:00
   Muted violins and pizzicato, rehearsal 38

   Muted violins enter late in the bar, with short rests between their phrases. The cellos and basses play pizzicato. The broken phrasing alludes to Dora Penny’s slight stammer.

2. 0:32
   Dora and her memoir

   Dora was the daughter of the rector of Wolverhampton and a close friend of the Elgars. Years later, as Mrs Richard Powell, she wrote Edward Elgar: Memories of a Variation.

3. 1:04
   Flute melody over muted violins

   The flute plays a sustained melody while the muted violins continue their short, broken figures. Earlier in the variation the solo viola has the sustained line.

Joins

1. 1:04
   The flute’s phrase over pizzicato strings

   The G major dance stays at Allegretto. Over pizzicato cellos and basses, the flute holds its melody across the bar lines. The oboes play short figures between its phrases, and the muted violins continue their off-beat figures.

1. 0:00
   Dan in the Wye, rehearsal 47

   The strings descend, and bassoons and double basses continue in quavers. In Elgar’s account Dan fell into the Wye, paddled upstream to find a landing place and scrambled out with a delighted bark.

2. 0:25
   Sinclair’s challenge to Elgar

   Sinclair challenged Elgar to set the river incident to music. Elgar already knew Dan well. On visits to the organist’s house he wrote short musical sketches of the dog’s moods in the visitors’ book.

1. 0:00
   Solo cello, rehearsal 52

   A solo cello begins molto espressivo and ad libitum for its first two bars, accompanied by quiet violas and the other cellos. At a tempo the whole cello section takes up the tune, marked largamente ed espressivo.

2. 0:30
   Nevinson, cellist in Elgar’s trio

   Nevinson played chamber music with Elgar on violin and Hew David Steuart-⁠Powell at the piano. In his written tribute Elgar praised his playing and recorded that Nevinson put his scientific and artistic skills at his friends’ disposal, wholeheartedly.

3. 1:52
   Ending for solo cello

   The orchestra makes a diminuendo, and the solo cello has the last phrase. After a long pause the cello rises once more over held lower strings. The final marking is attacca, and the Romanza follows without a break.

Joins

1. 1:52
   Wind releases under the solo cello

   Elgar writes diminuendo molto across the winds and strings at the close of the G minor Andante. The flutes and oboes stop first, then the bassoons and horns. The basses are silent, and the orchestral cellos hold a low note beneath the soloist’s last upward phrase and its long pause.

1. 0:00
   Clarinet melody, Moderato in G major

   A clarinet plays the melody over rising and falling lines in the second violins and cellos. The first violins join, and the winds then extend the phrase. Elgar called this a Romanza; it opens Moderato in G major.

2. 0:18
   Clarinet quotation of Mendelssohn

   The clarinet quotes Calm Sea and Prosperous Voyage by Mendelssohn over a timpani roll marked ppp. Elgar asks for side-drum sticks on the timpani. In his commentary he identified the sound beneath the tune as the engines of a distant liner.

3. 1:05
   Lady Mary Lygon

   Lady Mary Lygon of Madresfield Court, the probable subject, supported local music-making and sailed to Australia in 1899. Her initials, L.M.L., appear in Elgar’s sketches. In print, three asterisks replace them, and in the variation the clarinet plays a borrowed tune.

Joins

1. 0:18
   The clarinet’s Mendelssohn quotation

   Poco rallentando leads to tranquillo at rehearsal 56. The upper strings fade out while divided violas keep a small rising-and-falling figure moving. A soft timpani roll and held cello notes support the clarinet’s Mendelssohn quotation. The score puts quotation marks around the borrowed phrase.

2. 1:02
   Brass crescendo before Come prima

   Trumpets, trombones and tuba enter softly and then make a crescendo over repeated figures in the low strings. The timpani change from a roll to measured notes. The brass soon drop away at the diminuendo molto. At Come prima the clarinet and the moving strings of the G major Romanza return.

1. 0:00
   Opening of the finale

   Elgar’s own variation begins softly at rehearsal 61, Allegro. Short phrases pass between first violins, cellos and bassoons above detached notes in the bass. The trombones and tuba are marked ppp.

2. 0:30
   Elgar’s nickname, “Edoo”

   E.D.U. is Elgar’s spelling of Edoo, Alice’s pet name for him. He placed himself last of the fourteen portraits. At the time he was teaching violin, and he described the variation as his answer to discouragement about his musical future.

3. 1:30
   Recollections of C.A.E. and Nimrod

   The finale, Elgar’s self-portrait, recalls two earlier variations: Alice’s, C.A.E., and Jaeger’s, Nimrod. Their broad melodies return among the quick figures of Edoo’s theme.

4. 2:04
   Woodwind over divided cellos

   The full texture thins to woodwind phrases above divided cellos, which play soft quavers in the Allegro tempo. When the first violins return, Elgar marks them pianississimo, non legato, very soft with the notes kept separate.

5. 3:18
   Revised ending, Worcester, 1899

   After the London première, Jaeger persuaded Elgar to enlarge the ending. Elgar added ninety-six bars and an organ part, which is optional in the published score. He conducted the expanded version himself at the Worcester Three Choirs Festival on 13 September 1899.

6. 4:08
   Final chords in G major

   The full orchestra plays chords of G major. The bass holds G while the upper parts finish their last phrases, and a timpani roll makes a crescendo beneath the final chord. Elgar lets the chord sound, then cuts it off.

Joins

1. 2:04
   Divided cellos and basses before rehearsal 73

   The rushing string phrases are followed by repeated soft quavers in the divided cellos and basses. Above them, oboes, clarinets and bassoons play phrases marked espressivo. The Allegro tempo continues. At rehearsal 73 the violins, very quiet, take over the melody over pizzicato bass notes.

2. 2:34
   Animando at rehearsal 74

   Low brass and timpani hold a soft chord while the violins’ short figures diminish. At animando (rehearsal 74) the cellos play a rising figure and the basses play arco again. Woodwinds and horns take up the rising phrase, and a new crescendo begins.

3. 4:08
   Tonic pedal on G

   The closing phrases are in G major. The brass sustain the chords while the strings play their last runs, and a held G stays in the bass. Elgar marks ritardando, then writes a final crescendo in the low winds and timpani before the orchestra’s last attack.