The Kingdom, op. 51, is an oratorio for soloists, chorus and orchestra composed by Edward Elgar.
It was first performed at the Birmingham Music Festival on October 3, 1906, with the orchestra conducted by the composer, and soloists Agnes Nicholls, Muriel Foster, John Coates and William Higley. The dedication is "A. M. D. G."
Following The Dream of Gerontius and The Apostles, the Birmingham Triennial Music Festival commissioned Elgar to produce an...
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The Kingdom, op. 51, is an oratorio for soloists, chorus and orchestra composed by Edward Elgar.
It was first performed at the Birmingham Music Festival on October 3, 1906, with the orchestra conducted by the composer, and soloists Agnes Nicholls, Muriel Foster, John Coates and William Higley. The dedication is "A. M. D. G."
Following The Dream of Gerontius and The Apostles, the Birmingham Triennial Music Festival commissioned Elgar to produce another large oratorio for the 1906 festival. This was The Kingdom, which continues the narrative of the lives of Jesus's disciples. It depicts the community of the early church, Pentecost, and the events of the next few days.
Elgar had been planning a work depicting the Apostles as ordinary men, reacting to extraordinary events, for many years. His ideas outgrew the confines of a single work: parts of The Kingdom were written before The Apostles, and later Elgar considered them as the first two parts of a trilogy. The Kingdom is, in effect, its...
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