Worcester is the city most closely associated with Elgar. It was here that he came to live as a boy of just two years of age (in 1859) and stayed until just after his marriage in 1889.
For the last five years of his life he returned to live in Worcester.
The Cathedral at Worcester stands in the heart of the city on the bank of the River Severn. Although he was born and remained a Catholic, the Anglican Cathedral played a large part in both his musical upbringing and also as a venue for the performance of many of his finest works.
Elgar is quoted as saying: "I drew my first ideas of music from the Cathedral; from books borrowed from the music library when I was eight, nine or ten. They were barbarously printed in eight different clefs, all of which I learnt before I was 12."
The Catholic Church at Worcester is about half a mile from the Cathedral and, because the timings of the Sunday Services were slightly at variance he was able to leave the Catholic Church and run the length of the High Street and be in time to hear the ending of the Anglican service.
Situated only a stone's throw from the Elgar Music Shop in the High Street he was, in later life, to hear almost all his works performed in the Cathedral - often with himself as conductor.
In later life he was to write to a friend: 'Yesterday I went to Worcester and had the joy of sitting in the old library of the Cathedral amongst the manuscripts I have often told you of - the view down the river across to the hills just as the monks saw it and as I have seen it for so many years - it seems so curious to feel that I played among the tombs and in the cloisters when I could scarcely walk, and now the Dean and canons are so polite and show me everything new, alterations, discoveries etc. It is a sweet old place, especially, to me, the library into which so few go.'
The year following Elgar's death, the Elgar Memorial Window was unveiled at the Cathedral which shows a scene from Elgar's work "The Dream of Gerontius". This is unusual in that the Memorial to a Catholic Composer, featuring a work whose text is by a Catholic Cardinal, is to be found in an Anglican Cathedral.
A young visitor rests beneath the watchful gaze of Elgar's Memorial Statue.
The statue, which is situated in Worcester High Street, looks out towards the Cathedral. The statue was unveiled in 1981 by the Prince of Wales on the composer's birthday - 2nd June.
Just behind the statue's left shoulder is the former site of Number 10, High Street, where the Elgar Brothers Music Shop once stood. This was owned by Elgar's father and uncle and was where Elgar lived as a child.
Elgar was almost completely self-taught in the subject of music and the availability of the music manuscripts and instruments to which he had access in the family business was invaluable to him. Nevertheless, the fact that he had an upbringing in 'trade' combined with the strict Victorian and Edwardian class system proved to be a source of permanent embarassment to him in later life!
A plaque on the wall of Russell and Dorrell's Department Store marks the original site of the Elgar Brothers' music shop.
A short distance along the High Street from the Cathedral is the Worcester City Guildhall.
The present-day building, which was built between 1721 and 1724, occupies the same site as an earlier building. The cost of the Guildhall was £3,727, of which £800 was provided by the Corporation and the balance raised by subscription.
Over the years the building, or parts of it, have been used as a coffee shop, an Assize Court, Judges lodgings, and as shops in general.
Major restorations during the 1870's have left the Guildhall pretty much as we see it today.
Worcester Cathedral:
The Elgar Statue - High Street
Worcester City Guildhall
It was at the Guildhall, on September 12th 1905, that Elgar was made a Freeman of the City of Worcester by the Mayor of Worcester, Hubert Leicester who had been a childhood friend of Elgar's.
At the ceremony, at which Elgar wore the Doctor of Music Robes which had been awarded to him by Yale University of America and which are now on display at the Birthplace Museum, Elgar was presented with a silver casket containing the Freedom scroll. Following the ceremony a procession led to the Cathedral and passed the Elgar Brothers shop where Elgar saluted an old gentleman whose face could be seen at an upper window. It was his father who was too ill to attend the ceremony.
Inside the Guildhall (which is open to the public) can be seen a bronze bust of Elgar sculpted in 1935 by Donald Gilbert.
According to Lady Elgar's diaries, Sir Philip Burne-Jones invited Elgar to sit for a portrait when they met at a party in October 1912. There were several sittings over the winter and spring and the portrait was exhibited at the Royal Academy in May 1913.
It was purchased by a few fellow citizens of Worcester and presented to the City in 1923.
The Elgar's association with Worcester dates back to around 1841, sixteen years before the birth of Edward Elgar, when William Henry Elgar, a native of Dover, settled in the City. William Elgar was born in 1821 and at the age of 19, after serving an apprenticeship with the music dealers, Coventry and Hollier, of Soho, London, decided to move to Worcester. Here he set up his own music and piano-tuning business.
On first moving to Worcester he lodged at the 'Shades' Tavern in Mealcheapen Street and here he was to meet his future wife, Ann Greening whose brother-in-law ran the tavern and who had moved from the near-by village of Claines to work at the tavern.
Mealcheapen Street is at the opposite end of High Street from the Cathedral and the tavern has long been demolished but the name 'Shades' lives on - if only as the name of a hair stylists!
Elgar's parents, William Henry Elgar (1821-1906) and Ann Elgar (1822-1902) are buried at Astwood Cemetery, Worcester. Also buried in this grave are his brothers Henry John Elgar (1850-1864), and Frederick Joseph Elgar (1859-1866) who both died in childhood when Elgar himself was only young. The wooden cross nearby marks the grave of Elgar's other brother, Frank.
The grave has recently been restored by the Elgar family, the Elgar Society and the Elgar Foundation and is situated at Astwood Cemetery. The Cemetery itself is about one and a half miles north of the city centre just past Rainbow Hill where Elgar's last home, Marl Bank, stood (now the site of a block of flats called Elgar Court).
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