Elgar's lost "Beau Brummel" music

[Acutamusicelgar]

Hello folks : I am posting this message in the hopes that it may possibly lead to the rediscovery of a lost Elgar work of, apparently, major proportions.

Elgar wrote his "Beau Brummel" incidental music in 1928. The play was first performed in Birmingham, then went on tour round the UK and South Africa. The man who commissioned it, actor Gerald Lawrence, tried but failed to set up a London run : the music then disappeared.

One excerpt, the "Beau Brummel Minuet" was published in 1929. However, this was not from the original stage score (the music was the same but the scoring was altered).

Elgar scholars never looked into the question of where the play was performed or how extensive the music may have been. They believed that there was nothing much to it, and that it had only been performed in Birmingham. In December 2011 I published an article in the "Elgar Society Journal" in December 2011 which indicated that:

(i) We are probably talking about a full score at least 150 pages long, virtually all of which has vanished,

(ii) Elgar got the full score back from Lawrence after the play's run, but then must have given it away to a friend or destroyed it : either way, there is no record of what happened to it,

(iii) The orchestral parts were kept by Lawrence. He died in 1957 and lived in Hampstead except for 1939-1945 when he lived in Exmouth,

(iv) All the newspaper reports raved about the music. Reading between the lines it is possible that it was organised similarly to a film score, with themes for each leading character playing continuously under dialogue, and was very substantial in scope (the only surviving fragment, from Act 1 of the play, ends on score page 64 : there were four Acts).

Although the chances of the orchestral parts having survived are vanishingly remote, it seems to me that there is a faint possibility that the full score may still exist : it is in the nature of things that people are reluctant to throw away music manuscripts. However, if the score is still in existence it is probably now in the hands of non-musicians, i.e. the descendants of the original protagonists (Elgar's colleagues). So writing learned articles in music journals is only of limited use : if one could get an article into the national (UK) newspapers some results might be achieved. The problem is made worse by the fact that there could well not have been a composer's signature on the score, and the title on the score may have been "Brummel" rather than "Beau Brummel".

Hopefully this message will be of interest to Forum members, and you never know, someone may have contacts which may lead somewhere. If you look on the Acuta Music website there is a brief article about the "Beau Brummel" music and there are details of how to obtain a copy of my "Elgar Society Journal" article which gives all the details.

[Mark Thomas]

Thanks very much. I can't help but it's a tantalising prospect.