Elgar: The Dream Of Gerontius – Martyn Brabbins

This new album of Elgar’s choral-orchestral masterpiece ‘The Dream of Gerontius’ from Huddersfield Choral Society is optimally timed to coincide with major new film ‘The Choral’ (trailer here) which stars 3-time Oscar-nominated actor Ralph Fiennes playing the conductor of a Yorkshire choral society Elgar, ‘Gerontius’ and singing are integral to the plot of the film, which is the latest in a line of movies where classical composers and musicians are central to the story (e.g. Maestro, Tár, Amadeus) Set in 1916, the film, written by Alan Bennett and directed by Nicholas Hytner (the duo behind ‘The History Boys’ and ‘The Lady in the Van’), centres around a northern English choral society as they prepare to perform Elgar’s ‘Dream of Gerontius’ despite the challenges and losses of key singers fighting on the Western front.

There are striking parallels between the choir in the film and the Huddersfield Choral Society recorded here:

23 members of the real-life Huddersfield Choral Society served in World War I, just as in the film, where tenors and basses are in short supply

There was a celebrated Huddersfield performance of ‘Gerontius’ under the baton of Sir Edward Elgar himself in 1917

‘The Choral’ is both the name of the film and the nickname given to the Huddersfield Choral Society

The film is set in the fictional town of Ramsden, the name of the land upon which Huddersfield is built

Huddersfield Choral Society made the hugely successful first-ever recording of the work in 1945, but the choir’s 120-year relationship with Elgar’s masterpiece stretches all the way back to 1905.