In Reply to: RE: A Dvorak Urban Legend, and Anna Moffo posted by Chris from Lafayette on December 12, 2014 at 10:46:09:
Gee, congrats, Red-Letter Day, you came up with some Gerontius trivia that my Jewish ancestors who were alive at the time were unaware of, and so was I!
First, one has to remember that the premiere was actually in a civil building--Birmingham Town Hall. And it does appear that Elgar allowed Bowdlerized performances, so until 1910 performances in Anglican venues were allowed to soft-pedal Purgatory, etc. Dunno how many did. "Anglo-Catholic" Anglican churches would have been OK with that.
Two sound bites: I tell people that Gerontius is Dante in 90 minutes.
And LKJ Setright allowed that Gerontius could turn anyone into a Catholic, as long as it was playing... . And LKJ was Orthodox Jewish.
I must confess that my efforts to get Ken Kessler to sit down and listen to it in one go, have been unavailing.
ATB,
John
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Follow Ups
- Erm, perhaps you meant "Nihil Obstat," but the Anglicans dropped Latin centuries ago - John Marks 15:20:58 12/12/14 (1)
- D'oh! I did mean "nihil obstat" [nt] ;-) - Chris from Lafayette 15:27:08 12/12/14 (0)