Incomplete and unsung

[matesic]

OK if you insist. Elgar's express "death bed" instructions to Billy Reed were that he should burn the disconnected heap of manuscript papers that comprised Elgar's third symphony. Instead, Reed used them to embellish his own memoirs and whet the appetite of scavengers. It wasn't until shortly before the manuscript was due to enter the public domain that the family decided to limit the fallout damage by authorising someone (Anthony Payne) to complete the piece "officially".

Whether or not the results are convincing, they certainly aren't Elgar's conception, if indeed he ever had a coherent one. I may be wrong but I get the impression that, after the initial enthusiasm, orchestras and conductors have come to conclusion that the piece as we hear it actually isn't very good. Anyone who's played much of Elgar knows that his part-writing is very distinctive, meticulously annotated with articulation and expression marks which are notably sparse in Payne's completion. However it sounds, the symphony simply doesn't look or feel like Elgar to play.

I'm hoping the public really has lost interest by now so we can forget Elgar 3 ever existed and its temporary place in the concert hall can be taken by more deserving symphonies, for example Moeran's. Or even Gordon Jacob's orchestration of the Organ Sonata which I find thrilling.

[Mark Thomas]

I don't know which work matesic is thinking of, but my vote would be for Robert Walker's dire "realisation" of Elgar's Piano Concerto.

[Gareth Vaughan]

Hear, hear to that, Mark.

[Alan Howe]

My candidate for oblivion would also be the so-called Elgar Piano Concerto. Absolutely unnecessary. The '3rd Symphony' is one 'completion' I rather enjoy, as long as one realises that it's by 'Elgar-Payne'.

[giles.enders]

I am really pleased to have Anthony Payne's realization of Elgar's 3rd symphony. It works at every level.  It wouldn't matter who the composer was, it is good. As for the so called Elgar piano concerto, it is really by Robert Walker with bits of Elgar thrown in. It is quite frankly dire.

There is the moral question of whether composers works should be completed or tampered with. On the whole I think it is useful if done responsibly, otherwise people like me would never hear all the symphonies of Schubert. I am happy that they are available for me to make my own mind up about them. (Schubert was right to abandon them and move on).

Lyapunov completed Balakirov's 2nd piano concerto, I am pleased to have heard it. The list is endless.

[Gareth Vaughan]

Quite so, Giles.

[Alan Howe]

I think the question is how a 'completion' is advertised. 'Elgar-Payne' seems to me appropriate for Symphony No.3.

[matesic]

I'm know I'm swimming against the stream, but I do worry about "authenticity" in music. When a contemporary composer makes a conscious attempt to imitate the style of a long-dead master or a bygone era I feel in an obscure way that I'm being cheated. Whether or not it's passed off as the real thing, I can only regard a brand new painting in the style of Turner or Picasso as ersatz, pastiche or (to use the closest English word I can think of) fake. Nobody would dream of completing an unfinished canvas by Monet, and any attempt to imitate the style, no matter how convincing, would be regarded as mere wallpaper. The real thing should feel like it contains something of the man himself and his times (sorry about the sexist language...). Remembering Beecham's epithet about the shallow love of the British for music, just the noise of it isn't enough.

[giles.enders]

The analogy with paintings doesn't hold, to complete a Monet would mean that it can't be undone, whereas a completion of any music still leaves the original intact. 'Pictures at an Exhibition' is an example, though this wasn't a completion as such. I believe that completions of music particularly from the classical and romantic periods are as much because the public who like classical music crave anything that is not post 1950.

[matesic]

OK, to improve my analogy how about literature? Say JD Salinger left behind a drawer full of disconnected drafts for an incomplete novel but no overall scheme. Or architecture; Christopher Wren leaves a stack of partial drawings but no complete sketch to show the shape of the church he had in mind. I know I'm shifting my ground somewhat, but I've been trying to analyse what makes me feel so strongly about this. All Elgar's major works have schemata that make you think they're about something, not necessarily something tangible but an integral experience of some kind. If he left no structure there can be no "Elgar" symphony. You're quite right about public craving but I think we owe it to Elgar not to completely traduce his wishes.

[Mark Thomas]

There's certainly an argument (I'd put it no stronger than that) in cases of a composer's death preventing completion, or where he expressed a wish that surviving sketches weren't to be turned into "completed" works, although in that case why not do what Brahms did and just destroy them? I don't really see the moral argument otherwise, although I do take matesic's point about such completions lacking the spirit of the original composer.

[matesic]

I guess Elgar didn't get enough advance warning of his death to tidy up! I'd be happier if Payne had spliced the fragments into a tribute piece in his own style. Could have been rather poignant.

[eschiss1]

He asked for the sketches of his symphony to be burned. (Ironically, I prefer parts of what Payne did with it to Elgar's 2 symphonies - but that does show how little I understand Elgar's spirit musically!)

[Alan Howe]

but that does show how little I understand Elgar's spirit musically!

You're too modest. It may simply be a question of personal taste, to which you are perfectly entitled.

[giles.enders]

I think Matesic has opened a can or worms but let me try to address some of the points made. It was said that Brahms destroyed his incomplete works but that didn't stop someone bringing out 'Brahms 3rd piano concerto, which was really his violin concerto with piano substitute.

There are many works which have been completed by others and thinking about the most successful completions, they have been done by composers who had known the original composer.  A very few examples:
Debussy- Petite Suite, Rhapsodie, Khamma, and La Chante de la maison Usher.  Albeniz- Rhapsodia Espanola, Navarra.  Puccini,-Turandot. Borodin,-Prince Igor. Mussorsky,-Khovanchina. Satie- Gymnopedies orchestrated.

Other completions are Stanford's piano concerto No.3. Scriabin's Mysterium.

There is also the question of arranger/composers using other composers works. The ballet Les Sylphides springs to mind as does La Boutique Fantastique. Britten based his ballets Matinee Musicales and Soiree Musicales on music by Rossini.

There is also the question of blatantly re arranging a composers works. Robinson Crusoe is an example.   

If people are concerned about the integrity of what is done with a composers score then how was an old German allowed to conduct Beethoven symphonies at half speed or Hamilton Harty performing Handel's Messiah with a chorus of a thousand. 

Book references:  Dickens, Edwin Drood would be a frustrating read if some one hadn't had a go at finishing it.

And now when was the last time anyone listened to The Polovtsian Dances or Dohnanyi's Variations on a Nursery Theme.