(Elgar said as much in his programme note.) (The Enigma theme is a counterpoint on some well-known melody.) This tune must fit with the main theme of the Enigma Variations - the ‘Enigma theme’.(Elgar couldn’t believe no one had spotted it.) We’re looking for a very well-known tune.Here are some boxes we know must be checked by any solution we propose: It is useful, then, to go back to basics and ask what we actually know. What do we know?īecause the hunt for the enigma has continued for over a century, there are dozens of conflicting views not only about what the solution is, but about what criteria the solution needs to satisfy. I thought that you of all people would guess it.Įlgar died in 1934, and he took the solution with him to the grave. Of course not, but it is so well-known that it is extraordinary no-one has found it.įinally, when asked by his friend Dora Penny what the hidden tune was, since she had tried and failed to figure it out, he replied: The theme is a counterpoint on some well-known melody which is never heard.Īnd then, in 1924, when someone suggested to Elgar that the hidden theme was God Save the King, he replied: This was backed up in a 1905 biography of Elgar, the writing of which had the cooperation of the composer himself: What that theme is no one knows except the composer. Mr Elgar tells us that the heading Enigma is justified by the fact that it is possible to add another phrase, which is quite familiar, above the original theme that he has written. In 1900, he clarified further the nature of the enigma in an interview with the Musical Times: So the principal Theme never appears, even as in some late dramas - eg Maeterlinck’s L’Intruse and Les sept Princesses - the chief character is never on the stage. The Enigma I will not explain - its “dark saying” must be left unguessed, and I warn you that the connexion between the Variations and the Theme is often of the slightest texture further, through and over the whole set another and larger theme “goes”, but is not played. Here is the first thing he said in public on this central enigma, in a programme note that accompanied the piece’s first performance in 1899: An unheard themeĮlgar’s love of codes and ciphers was well-known, and, according to him, he placed a puzzle at the centre of this theme and variations. Its fame is due in large part to its beauty - its Nimrod theme must be one of the most moving passages of music ever written - but it has also captured people’s imagination for more than 100 years because, in its composition, Elgar set a puzzle that has never been solved. Over a few months between 18, Edward Elgar composed what has become one of the most famous pieces of classical music in the world, the Enigma Variations. Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater: the solution to Elgar’s Enigma Variations?Ī new solution to the enigma at the heart of Elgar’s most famous work.

Elgar enigma variations