A famous map and a famous composer who lived nearby

[Mabouya]

A neat little bit on the BBC web site:

BBC - Travel - The world’s oldest medieval map

Edward Elgar taking a break from an afternoon spin.

[ZenNMotion]

A neat little bit on the BBC web site:

BBC - Travel - The world’s oldest medieval map

Edward Elgar taking a break from an afternoon spin.

Since you're curious, you should listen to one of the greatest pieces of music ever composed for 'cello. Read the story behind the piece capturing post-Great War melancholy, bittersweet memory of better times, and what Elgar means to Britain. Then read about the cellist who is largely regarded by the music world to truly "own" the piece more than anyone else, what she meant (means) to Britain and her heroic battle with MS as a young woman, ironically captured in the music she adopted before she became ill. Jaqueline DuPre, Elgar Cello Concerto in E minor.

[Paul Jacobs]

While the recording with Daniel Barenboim is possibly the best known and most highly rated, it is interesting that Jacqueline du Pre made an earlier recording with John Barbirolli conducting. John Barbirolli was a cellist as well as a conductor and he had played in the orchestra at the premier of Elgar's Cello concerto in 1919.

I lived in and cycled around Malvern for a few years. Elgar lived in Malvern for 12 years and I like to think we may have ridden some of the same routes.

[Mabouya]

BTW, as kooky as the geometry of the frame in the sculpture appears to our modern eyes, it really is an accurate reproduction of Elgar's Sunbeam. And, he does seem to have been a regular rider.

Elgar and his bicycles | National Trust

I lived in and cycled around Malvern for a few years. Elgar lived in Malvern for 12 years and I like to think we may have ridden some of the same routes.

His friend, Rosa Burley, remembered these times: "Our cycling trips began in earnest after 'Gerontius'...There cannot have been a lane within twenty miles of Malvern that we did not ultimately find...to Upton, to Tewkesbury or Hereford, to the Vale of Evesham...to the lovely villages on the west side of the hills...as we rode, he would often become silent and I knew that some new melody or, more probably, some new piece of orchestral texture, had occurred to him".