Composer of the Week: Edward Elgar

Michael Zwiebach on May 30, 2013
Edward Elgar

There’s something satisfying about the fact that over these weeks when so many graduation ceremonies will feature the Pomp and Circumstance March No. 1, we also commemorate its composer’s birthday.

June 2 is the big day for Edward Elgar, a composer we really should not see through the lens of Pomp and Circumstance. He was the son of lower-middle class Catholics, at a time when English anti-Catholic prejudice could still cost a person a job. His response to World War I was far from flag-waving enthusiasm, which you can hear in such postwar classics as the Cello Concerto.

He wrote his fair share of great tunes, as in the Enigma Variations, the work that really made his name. He was the first of a series of prominent English composers who put English concert music in the world’s ear, but he really wasn’t that public a figure. Read about his eccentric side along with many other fun facts and music and video in SFCV’s composer gallery.