Reviewed 29 January 2026
Having recorded the work last year, David Temple and Crouch End Festival Chorus reconnect with their original soloists and are joined by Hertfordshire Chorus for a performance that champions Elgar's underrated final oratorio and showcases an immense sympathy for the work from all performers.
There is something rather Wagner-like about Elgar's development of his final two oratorios, The Apostles and The Kingdom. For a start, his increased exposure to Wagner's music led to an increased fluidity in his approach to the drama. But in his creation of the works, Elgar's process rather resembled that of Wagner when that composer developed The Ring from a sketch for a single opera. The idea for the oratorios came to him in late 1899 when he received the commission for the 1900 Birmingham Festival that would lead to The Dream of Gerontius. Plans continued in 1902 when he was planning a large scale work, notionally The Apostles, for the 1903 Birmingham Festival. In the event, there was too much material and what had been planned as the final part of The Apostles (which now ended with the Ascension) developed into The Kingdom which premiered in Birmingham in 1906. His original ideas had included a third part, covering the 'Last Judgement & the next world as in Revelations'. Whether this would have come to pass is anyone's guess, but Elgar seemed to lose confidence in the idea and The Kingdom would be his last oratorio.
The Kingdom has long had its champions with many averring that the work is finer and more sophisticated than The Dream of Gerontius. But there is another difference, The Kingdom is firmly Bible-based, telling the story of the Apostles evangelising using a text that Elgar assembled from purely Biblical sources. Gerontius by contrast uses Cardinal Newman's imaginative reconstruction of the journey of a soul. Whilst this had a little too much Roman Catholic dogma in it for some of Elgar's contemporaries, the story itself has perhaps more resonance for the non-religious. Gerontius is about the trial of a soul, a concept that perhaps can be appreciated by many in its allegorical form. By contrast, The Kingdom is firmly Biblical and requires you to at least know the Acts of the Apostles. Elgar tells the story, but his expansion of the Biblical text is done in a way that creates a work that is contemplative rather than adding narrative clarity.
The conductor David Temple is amongst those who believe strongly in The Kingdom. He and Crouch End Festival Chorus (CEFC), which Temple co-founded in 1984, recorded The Kingdom for Signum Classics last year with soloists Francesca Chiejina (soprano), Dame Sarah Connolly (mezzo-soprano), Benjamin Hulett (tenor) and Ashley Riches (bass), and the London Mozart Players. Temple and CEFC were joined by the same soloists and Temple's other choir, Hertfordshire Chorus, plus London Orchestra da Camera for a performance of Elgar's The Kingdom at the Southbank Centre's Royal Festival Hall on Thursday 29 January 2026.
The result was a very choir-led performance with over 230 singers on the Festival Hall platform. This meant that the choral climaxes were truly glorious, and certainly both choirs were on fine form (this is not easy music, by any means) not only in terms of sound but in the way the singers attacked the text. But it also meant that in some passages the weight of the choir gave over-prominence to the choral writing. This is especially important because in The Kingdom, Elgar writes fluidly, interleaving choir, soloists and orchestra, so balance is always important. In the moments when he wrote something like an operatic ensemble, for choir, orchestra and soloists, the soloists' contributions were in danger of being masked by the choir.
Luckily all four soloists brought strong personality to the performance. Though Elgar does give the solo parts names - Mary (Francesca Chiejina), Mary Magdalene (Sarah Connolly), St John (Benjamin Hulett), St Peter (Ashley Riches) - the roles are more types than characters. But here, each singer brought strong character to their contributions even when just singing a couple of lines. In the work, Elgar seems to have moved firmly away from the idea of arias and choruses, the writing more close to fluid dialogue (again we come back to Wagner and his ideas that came to fruition in The Ring). The oratorio's best known number, the one excerpted on 78s, is Mary's The Sun Goeth Down from Part Four [you can hear Isobel Baillie singing it on YouTube] but this is more a fluid arioso rather than a structured aria.
Temple and the orchestra made the Prelude full of restless drama, leading finally to something consoling. Part One began with a long, fluid ensemble where Elgar interwove chorus and soloists, with a dramatic moment for Chiejina, a short yet impassioned contribution from Connolly and Hulett in vibrant form. Riches also contributed some fluid arioso and the concluding ensemble, with its fine choral sound, led directly into Riches' flexible recitative. Whilst Elgar gave various soloists the narrative, the work focuses on St Peter and Riches brought a sense of definitive belief in the text to his performance. This part of the work focused on the election of Matthias as an Apostle (in a rather blink and you'd miss it sort of way) with Part One ending with a vibrant full choral ensemble.
Part Two is one long duet for Mary (Chiejina) and Mary Magdalene (Connolly) recalling Christ's healing of the lame man. Fluidly written again, it was as much about the orchestra as the two soloists. The central section of the work, Part Three, focuses on the first Pentecost with the descent of the Holy Spirit. It opened with another complex multi-layered ensemble featuring choir and male soloists, before Connolly's vivid narration of the descent of the Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues. The subsequent section of the scene was vigorous and vivid, the chorus interacting with the soloists. But despite a sense of ensemble, the focus was very much on St Peter and Riches brought focus, fluidity and a sense that the words meant something to his long and textually complex solo. And Riches was nicely trenchant at times, reminding us that St Peter was no goody two-shoes. This part also ended in an ensemble where Elgar wove the various layers into a satisfying whole.
Part Four began with a lyrical prelude before more vivid narration from Connolly. The response of St John (Hulett) and St Peter (Riches) to the healing of the lame man was powerful and built to a fine climax. Yet the focus of the movement remains on Mary's 'The sun goeth down', something rather meditative and thoughtful sung after Peter and John's arrest. Here Chiejina gave us some lovely floated notes and fine words, but as the piece became more complex I started being reminded of Richard Strauss. Chiejina ended on a note of radiant confidence. The final Part focuses on the breaking of bread in the Upper Room and ends with the Lord's Prayer. The scene began with orchestral passages giving echoes of Elgar's orchestral writing. Despite the rather sober subject, the writing for chorus and soloists was full of vigour. The actual breaking of the bread was a complex yet focused ensemble, the choral climax leading to a relatively low-key setting of the Lord's Prayer.
David Temple's drew a fine performance from his two choirs, but overall this was about the flow of the whole, allowing the drama to draw us along. He did allow time for moments of pause or contemplation, but it was more about the greater whole. The orchestral contribution was certainly creditable, but I rather missed the sophistication and plushness of sound from an ensemble like the London Philharmonic Orchestra who recorded the work in 1968 with Sir Adrian Boult (the work's first complete recording).
CEFC are now crowdfunding towards a planned recording of The Apostles, and on this showing deserve every support.
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