First broadcast in Masterworks: Six Pieces of Britain on BBC Two England, 17 July 1999 at 18.55.

Clip of Jacqueline du Pré removed as it is subject to copyright.

Michael Berkeley traces the story behind Edward Elgar's Cello Concerto, one of the best-loved pieces of British music. An intensely personal composition, it was written at the end of the First World War when Elgar was feeling increasingly out of step with his contemporaries, and draws on the traditions of figures such as Charles Stanford and Hubert Parry as well as the work of German symphonic composers.

The film includes contributions from biographers of Elgar and from Anthony Payne, who added an acclaimed conclusion to Elgar's Symphony No 3.

Also, in one of his last TV interviews, the late Yehudi Menuhin recalls times he spent with Elgar in a conversation with one of his former pupils,
Paul Watkins.

Watkins is the soloist for the complete performance of the Cello Concerto -filmed at London's Abbey Road Studios (which Elgar opened in 1931) with the BBC Symphony Orchestra conducted by Andrew Davis. Director Helen Mansfield

Series producer Peter Maniura

Digital widescreen

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