The Hallé – Elgar’s Enigma Variations

With its barn-storming brilliance, laced with Russian lyricism, Glinka’s overture to his Pushkin-inspired ‘magic opera’ Ruslan and Ludmilla, provides the perfect curtain-raiser to the Hallé’s Summer Season at The Bridgewater Hall.

Stravinsky, that towering figure of 20th-century music, died 50 years ago and this anniversary is marked here with his ballet Petrushka, the tale of a hapless puppet with human emotions. It starts in a blaze of brilliance evoking the St Petersburg Shrovetide Fair, but ends mysteriously with Petrushka’s theme wailing on trumpet as, chillingly, his ghost appears over the rooftops.

The opening theme of the Enigma Variations mixes melancholy and hope, encapsulating Elgar’s complex character, and at its heart are the variations enshrining his wife, Alice, and ‘Nimrod’, Augustus Jaeger, a portrait of a profound friendship, as he and Elgar discussed Beethoven quartets.

Glinka – Overture: Ruslan and Ludmilla
Stravinsky – Petrushka (1947)
Elgar – Enigma Variations

Sir Mark Elder Conductor

There will be a number of new measures to make the Hallé’s concerts as safe and enjoyable as possible. These measures include: • socially distanced seating and face masks (the total capacity of The Bridgewater Hall has been reduced). • timed entry into the building • no plans to have any bar and catering facilities • carefully managed toilet facilities