Salut d'Amour & Other Elgar Favourites

The smaller pieces are Elgar letting his sentimental side out without complications. Elgar died in 1934, but in the late 40's and the 50's in Britain the kind of tea-houses still flourished that were the natural home of music like this. In my own native city I recall Miss Cranston's and Miss Buick's - children were required to be especially on their best behaviour as the tea was served with buttered toast, saggy sandwiches and nondescript little cakes arranged on odd little folding multi-deck tables. In the background there were hard-up-looking musicians playing tasteful airs, and I would be surprised if I did not make my first acquaintance with Salut d'Amour and Sospiri in one of these now-forgotten establishments. This disc does not so much lead me down memory lane as drag me down it forcibly. I mean this in the very best sense - the forcefulness is in the recollections, not some inappropriate emphasis in the playing. Kennedy is recorded rather close-to, but I can live with that. Peter Pettinger seems admirable to me throughout. I heard him in person many years ago, and remember him largely for chewing gum as he played, but I have not been aware of him in a long time. Steven Isserlis is well known of course, and provides a fine soulful partnership to Kennedy in Salut d'Amour. In the UK this serves as the title of the disc, gloriously misprinted as Salt d'Amour which I hope they never change.

The recorded sound is really very good, and you will have gathered that this is a record that has quite a lot to say to me. For all I know this may be a minority opinion, but actually I should be surprised if these accounts are not thoroughly attractive to many. The era they recall is not one I greatly regret, but distance still lends enchantment to the view.