Nobody has yet solved the mystery of Elgar's magnificent Enigma Variations. Although we know the identities of the friends portrayed in each variation, no-one has yet positively identified the other theme that Elgar declared goes with the opening melody. The work has lost none of its power or passion over the years, and includes the glorious ‘Nimrod’, Elgar’s heartfelt tribute to his great friend Jaeger. Englishness of a more metropolitan kind underlies the second of Vaughan Williams’ nine symphonies, although there is actually very little that is obviously London in the work, aside from the unmistakable sound of the Westminster chimes. Completed in 1913, this ‘Symphony by a Londoner’ (as its composer preferred to call it) remains a compelling and imaginatively constructed orchestral canvas.