It was a good idea to bring Parry and Elgar together on this record of English music; and the Elgar pieces being placed between the two Parry suites, the juxtaposition makes it plain how much Elgar owed to the older master. It is not a great deal, but there are phrases, particularly in An English Suite, which just remind one of the greater master who was to come. Elgar's music is far more sophisticated and harmonically much richer, of course; but both come from the same stream of English music.
An English Suite, which was written later than Lady Radnor's, was only published after Parry's death (though he had completed it). It shows the bluff kind of heartiness which was not Parry's only side but also an occasional sign of the melancholy streak which was much stronger in Elgar. As Michael Kennedy says in his sleeve-note, Elgar ''had a healthy and genuine respect for Parry and owed him more than perhaps he would have admitted or than anyone has yet analysed in any detail''. One must also remember that the masterly and now popular Serenade for strings of Elgar was composed two years before Parry's suite for Lady Radnor and her orchestra.
Elgar's Elegy for strings dates from 1909 and is still little known. It is very short—the score, of a quite small page-size, takes only four pages—but full of elusive mastery. It is also enigmatic in that it starts in E flat major and ends in C major. Sospiri, a deeply moving piece, is by now better known.
The titles of the pieces in Lady Radnor's Suite show Parry paying homage to Bach, though that is as far as he goes and the work is in no way a pastiche; but, to quote Kennedy again, ''it is the 'Slow Minuet' for muted strings that . . . Elgar would have recognized as composed by a kindred spirit''.
Richard Hickox plays the slow movement of the Elgar Serenade with great feeling, obviously recognizing it as the core of the work and masterpiece of deep feeling such as Elgar quite often discovered in such short movements. The soft tone is particularly beautiful, while the full string sound is gloriously rich. In the Parry suites Hickox is inclined to underplay small slowings-up, a ritenuto here, and allargando there; but this is hardly an adverse criticism in a record of such fine playing.'