What do you do when you are supposed to write about a piece titled ‘Enigma’ if you have no idea what the enigma is actually about? You stay as close as possible to what the composer himself said about the piece. So when Charles A. Barry was asked to write programme notes for the premiere of the Enigma Variations in 1899, he quoted Elgar’s own words, giving the important message that ‘… through and over the whole set [of variations] another and larger theme “goes”, but is not played… So the principal Theme never appears….’

F.G. Edwards, editor of the Musical Times, did the same in his article on Elgar of October 1900. Starting with ‘Mr Elgar tells us that …,’ he mentions that it is possible to add another musical phrase, ‘which is quite familiar’, above the original theme that Elgar wrote. As correspondence shows, Edwards meticulously made all the changes to his text which Elgar and his wife Alice wanted after proofreading his article. Edwards even visited them a month before it was published to talk it over one more time. It is simply not possible that Elgar would have allowed any faulty information about his Enigma in Edward’s article. In his Elgar biography of 1905, Robert Buckley also claims that he is repeating Elgar’s own words. What he says about the work, confirms what Edwards mentioned about it. He is even more specific: ‘The theme is a counterpoint on some well-known melody which is never heard.’ It is remarkable that the importance of Edward’s and Buckley’s accounts, which both contain the same exact and thus essential information for the solution of Elgar’s enigma, has never been fully recognised until now.

Their remarks reveal that one should look for a melody hidden in the work that can be combined with the theme of the work. According to Elgar himself, this mysterious hidden melody, which is never heard in the work, but which is nevertheless present throughout, is ‘larger’ than the original theme of the work and can be said to be ‘quite familiar’. The actual theme of the Enigma Variations was composed as a countermelody, or a second part, to this melody.

This undermines many of the solutions that have been suggested so far. A number of solutions is actually founded on a similarity between the minor theme at the beginning of the work and another specific melody, for example some notes they have in common (like the Rule, Britannia theory). Several other solutions do actually mention a specific melody that can be combined with the Enigma theme (like the hymn Now the day is over), but there are always one or more details that do not fit. Yet, it is highly unlikely that a competent composer like Edward Elgar would have allowed such flaws in his enigma.

Later, Elgar himself dropped a hint about the hidden theme. Several years after the premiere he recounted to Dora Penny, a friend of the Elgars, how once, when he was depressed and wanted to stop composing, his friend and soul mate August Jaeger (= Nimrod) lectured him sternly. Jaeger referred to Ludwig van Beethoven who, despite his great difficulties, had always persevered and composed more and more beautiful music. ‘And-that-is-what-you-must-do’, he said and sang the theme of the second movement of Beethoven’s Sonata Pathétique to him. According to Elgar, this melody is referred to musically in the Nimrod variation. But how exactly? That has never been clarified.

The first thing I discovered was that, if a crotchet rest is inserted on every first beat of the bar, the beginning of the Nimrod melody can be combined perfectly with the - never clearly recognisable - melody of Beethoven’s Pathétique, which can therefore be said to be ‘larger’ and also ‘quite familiar’.  This countermelody turns out to be constructed out of groups of four notes, based on the rhythm of Elgar’s own name (‘Edward Elgar’: short-short-long-long, and then reversed: long-long-short-short). Equally surprising, this ‘Elgar theme’ follows the Beethoven melody in its notes. The musical symbolism of all this is obvious: in Nimrod Elgar follows Beethoven. This turns out to be the origin and the central idea of the whole composition.

Like some works of Elgar’s contemporaries Richard Strauss and Gustav Mahler, the Enigma Variations are in fact about the artist himself: all the themes of the work are derived from the ‘Elgar theme’. Firstly, the minor melody at the beginning of the work, which expresses the artist’s sadness and loneliness. The variations on this melody that follow, each with its individual character, portray several of Elgar’s friends. In the middle of this – as an emotional climax exactly in the centre of the work – lies the key to the solution of the enigma: Nimrod, which refers to his beloved friend August Jaeger who suggested to the artist that he should follow Beethoven’s example. Like the melody of Nimrod and the one at the beginning of the work the main theme of the final movement is based on the ‘Elgar theme’. In this Finale Elgar expresses the strength and confidence he experienced by following Beethoven’s example. The beginning of the Pathétique theme is hidden in the actual theme of the Enigma Variations, the ‘Elgar theme’ which appears in all kinds of forms. Thus one could say that Beethoven’s theme is present throughout the entire work without ever being played.

Of course, there can never be a hundred percent guarantee that a particular solution is correct and the one solution intended by Elgar, because the composer died without revealing it. But here for the first time we have a consistent theory for the peculiar enigma, in which the composer wrote a theme to go with a melody that is not played. Not only do all the notes fit this time, but some remarkable peculiarities in the work can be explained as well (like the unnatural form of the opening theme with its unusually regular structure and ever returning crotchet rest on the first beat and, for example, the appearance of the F instead of the expected G as sixth note of the Nimrod theme). Personal information about Elgar ties in with this solution as well, such as the account of his depressed frame of mind when he started the composition. And even the mysterious comment he made later to Dora Penny, ‘I thought that you of all people would guess it’, which surprised her as well, can easily be understood now.

It turns out that Elgar did not just hide any old tune in his masterwork, but that he expressed an idea which was important to him as an artist. To convey this idea, suggested to him by August Jaeger who was given a place of honour in the Enigma Variations (because his variation is quoted again in the Final), he used a familiar melody by a composer he highly respected: Ludwig van Beethoven.

Hans Westgeest

Hans Westgeest, Elgar’s Enigma Variations. The Solution. Corbulo Press, Leidschendam-Voorburg, 2007. Hardcover € 18,95 (ISBN 978-90-79291-01-4), paperback € 13,50 (ISBN 978-90-79291-03-8). Also available in Dutch. To order the book send an email to the author or go to: www.elgarsenigmavariations.eu