The 100th performance of the Elgar-Payne Symphony No.3, premiered to great acclaim in 1998, took place appropriately at the Three Choirs Festival in Hereford on 23 August. Paul Daniel conducted the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, and the performance was part of an Elgar focus at the Three Choirs Festival, which has been historically associated with the composer and his music.
Anthony Payne's masterly elaboration of Elgar's sketches for Symphony No.3, left incomplete at his death, has become one of the great success stories of classical music in recent years. Within two years the work has entered the international repertoire, performed by many of the world's leading orchestras and conductors in 16 countries to date. It has also been enthusiastically embraced by youth and amateur orchestras.
The symphony has already been recorded twice, by the BBC Symphony Orchestra under Andrew Davis on NMC (D053) and by the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra under Paul Daniel on Naxos (8.554719), with both discs attracting excellent reviews and rapidly becoming best-sellers - each recording has sold over 40,000 copies to date.
Britten's pacifist masterwork, combining war poetry by Wilfred Owen with the Latin Requiem Mass, is included in the Masterworks Library of full scores, ideal for conductors, students and music lovers.
The 100th performance of the Elgar-Payne Symphony No.3, premiered to great acclaim in 1998, took place appropriately at the Three Choirs Festival in Hereford on 23 August. Paul Daniel conducted the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, and the performance was part of an Elgar focus at the Three Choirs Festival, which has been historically associated with the composer and his music.
