Elgar & Farr: Cello Concertos New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, Sébastien Hurtaud & Benjamin Northey

• Sir Edward Elgar (1857 - 1934): Cello Concerto in E Minor, Op. 85:
• 1 Cello Concerto in E Minor, Op. 85: I. Adagio – Moderato 07:57
• 2 Cello Concerto in E Minor, Op. 85: II. Lento – allegro molto 04:59
• 3 Cello Concerto in E Minor, Op. 85: III. Adagio 04:59
• 4 Cello Concerto in E Minor, Op. 85: IV. Allegro – Moderato – Allegro, ma non troppo - Poco più lento – Adagio 11:56
• Gareth Farr (b. 1968): Cello Concerto:
• 5 Cello Concerto 'Chemin des Dames' 29:10
• Total Runtime 59:01

Info for Elgar & Farr: Cello Concertos

New Zealand composer Gareth Farr wrote his cello concerto after discovering some family history. His three great uncles left New Zealand to fight in France in World War I. All three were killed within weeks of arrival. Farr’s concerto is instantly accessible and is a dramatic and emotional statement.

Elgar’s famous concerto was also composed as a reaction to the horrors of the Western Front and the mass slaughter of so many young lives. Elgar could hear the heavy guns in France at night from his home in Sussex and they were a constant reminder of lost friends and of the world he knew slipping away. It was to be his last major orchestral work, the 3rd Symphony remaining unfinished.

Both concertos are played by the French cellist Sebastien Hurtaud.

The styles of the two works are very different, but there are similarities in their musical forms: they start and end with an emblematic theme and feel like ritual works – almost requiems. They are universal in scope and rooted in personal dramas connected to the First World War. Elgar was deeply affected by the slaughter in the trenches – at night he could hear the shelling from France from his house in Fittleworth, West Sussex – and may have been thinking of the death in battle of his ex-fiancée Helen Weaver’s son when he started work on the concerto. He completed it in 1919, when the Spanish flu continued to claim many young people’s lives. It was to be his final large-scale work.

Gareth Farr composed his concerto in memory of his three great-granduncles who were all killed in the Great War. Farr completed his concerto two days before the birth of my daughter Stella, in March 2017, and gave me an incredible gift by incorporating the name S.T.E.L.L.A. (E flat–B–E–A–A–A) into the final cadence, which symbolically represents HOPE.

At 100 years apart these two concertos are the testimony of the tragic years 1914–1918. But where there is life, hope is always reborn.

Sebastien Hurtaud, cello
New Zealand Symphony Orchestra
Benjamin Northey, conductor

Sebastien Hurtaud
The French concert cellist Sébastien Hurtaud was born in La Rochelle, France. Influenced by his family consisting of artists and skippers, the focus of Sébastien’s career has been on classical music and traveling around the world to discover new cultures and new composers, and to imbuing his interpretation of cello works from past centuries with this knowledge and experiences.

He first garnered international attention in 2009, after winning the “Adam” International Cello Competition, established by Alexander Ivashkin. Since then, Sébastien has developed a career as a soloist in Europe, New Zealand and the USA, as well as his native France, as a live and recording artist.

Conductors and presenters have praise Hurtaud’s lyric, sensitive and powerful playing. The international press has lauded his expressive performances. Forbes, Fanfare disc magazine, Strad Magazine, the New-Zealand Herald tribune and other publications describe his performances as "overwhelming, creative, dynamic and dramatic.[...] The soul of a Rostropovich and the virtuosity of a Feuerman [...]".

His new album with UK Rubicon Classics mirrors his artistic musical journey. Sébastien’s new album featuring the Elgar and Farr concertos was recorded under the direction of Australian conductor Benjamin Northey. In 2016, the French artist commissioned acclaimed New Zealand composer Gareth Farr to write the concerto “Chemin des Dames”, and then in 2017, he performed the world premiere of this cello concerto in Wellington, Auckland with the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra. The European premiere took place in France at the Laon International Festival accompanied by the Metz National Orchestra. Hurtaud was invited to celebrate the Armistice that ended World War I at the cathedral of the historic site of Les Invalides in Paris. He performed both the Elgar and the Farr concertos with the National Guard Symphonic Orchestra. He was invited to perform a concert that was broadcast by the prestigious Radio France Inter at the program "Le Grand Atelier” for millions' listeners.

Booklet for Elgar & Farr: Cello Concertos