that does not prevent it from being, as a whole, a very striking, beautiful, and original tone picture. Dr. Richter's interpretation very finely revealed all the strong points. He saved three minutes of the composer's own time by taking the _vivace_ sections at a somewhat quicker tempo. As at Covent Garden last March, Mr. Speelman played the incidental viola solo with marvellous beauty of tone. [Sidenote: ="The Coronation Ode."= _October 3, 1902._] To the Coronation Ode I listened with great curiosity, remembering the ordinary fate that overtakes patriotic composers and wondering what Sir Edward Elgar would make of the subject. I find that he has let himself be inspired by the nymph of the same spring whence flowed those two delightful Tommy Atkins marches known as "Pomp and Circumstance." It is popular music of a kind that has not been made for a long time in this country--scarcely at all since Dibdin's time. At least one may say that of the best parts, such as the bass solo and chorus "Britain, ask of thyself," and the contralto solo and chorus "Land of hope and glory." The former is ringing martial music, the latter a sort of Church parade song having the breath of a national hymn. It is the melody which occurs as second principal theme of the longer "Pomp and Circumstance" march, which I beg to suggest is as broad as "God Save the King," "Rule Britannia," and "See the Conquering Hero," and is perhaps the broadest open-air tune composed since Beethoven's "Freude schöner Götterfunken." Moreover, it is distinctively British--at once beefy and breezy. It is astonishing to hear people finding fault with Elgar for using this tune in two different compositions. I find it most natural in a composer, to whom music is a language in which, desiring to say exactly the same thing again, one has no choice but to say it in the same notes. Besides, such tunes are composed less frequently than once in fifty years. How then can one blame Elgar for not composing two in six months? The chorus enjoyed themselves over it, and so did the audience. As to the sentimental parts of the Ode, frankly I find them uninspired. CHAPTER VIII. RICHARD STRAUSS. [Sidenote: ="Don Quixote," Düsseldorf.= _May 26, 1899._]