The Starlight Express was adapted from a book by Algernon\nBlackwood, A Prisoner in Fairyland, for a theatre production in the\nWest End during the First World War, with music by Sir Edward\nElgar. Combining the usually contrasting elements of fairytale and\nmelodrama, The Starlight Express depicts the fantasy world\ninhabited by a group of children, who possess a magical ‘starlight’\nquality that has been lost by the adults around them. This is the\nmost comprehensive recorded version of The Starlight Express to\ndate, based on a new score prepared by the Elgar Edition, which has\nbeen adapted by the conductor Sir Andrew Davis.

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Our recording includes, in place of the play, a detailed account\nof the story, penned by the conductor Sir Andrew Davis better to\nreflect the original book and our pattern of speech today. ‘All the\nmusic, excepting the songs and interludes, was designed as\nmelodrama, and in some cases it is meaningless on its own’,\nexplains Sir Andrew, continuing: ‘I have therefore taken the bold\nstep of writing a narrative which is based partly on the play and\npartly on ‘A Prisoner in Fairyland’.

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Our narrator is the actor Simon Callow, known to an\ninternational audience for his roles in films such as Four Weddings\nand a Funeral and Shakespeare in Love. Callow was delighted to be\napproached, as he already knows and loves this music, having\ndelivered the narrative in a specially recorded concert performance\nof the incidental music, broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in 2007. The\nincidental music, complete with melodramatic passages which work in\nconjunction with the narrative, occupies all of Disc 1 and\ncontinues onto Disc 2. Then we have an extended suite of\nfreestanding orchestral movements and songs.

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As a bonus, we have included three songs which link directly to\nthis work. When a staged version of Blackwood’s book was first\nproposed, in 1914, another young composer, Clive Carey, was\ncommissioned to compose the incidental music; but the outbreak of\nwar forced the cancellation of the original production. When the\nplans were next revived, Elgar was approached, and he\nenthusiastically completed the score. However, Clive Carey had\nalready composed three songs, but they were never included in the\nfinal production. They have been orchestrated by Sir Andrew Davis\nfor this recording, and are heard here for the very first time.

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Our recording of The Starlight Express is performed by the\nScottish Chamber Orchestra under Sir Andrew Davis with two\ninternationally acclaimed soloists: the soprano Elin Manahan Thomas\nand baritone Roderick Williams.

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