A LITTLE-known period of Edward Elgar’s life is the subject of a play, Elgar and the Lunatic Asylum, by Tony Hobbs being staged at the Malvern Coach House Theatre from May 16 to 18.
Set when the composer was a young man and working as bandmaster at the Worcester City and County Asylum (one of the first mental institutions to introduce music as a healing therapy), the play is a mix of fact and fiction.
In it, Elgar’s real-life engagement to Helen is offset by an imagined romance with Miss Holloway who existed but left only the faintest of footprints.
King William IV, Silly Billy, also existed, but probably not in Elgar’s time.
Punctuated with Elgar’s music, the play is directed by Helen Wingrave, and supported by the Elgar Society and by MIND, the mental health charity.
Elgar and the Lunatic Asylum is at Malvern Coach House Theatre on Thursday and Friday, May 16 and 17, at 8pm and on Saturday, May 18, at 3pm and 8pm.
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