ABSTRACT
For Jaeger the beginning of 1904 brought painful developments at the Musical Times, and a growing feeling of insecurity over his relationship with Elgar. The continuing incompatibility with F.G. Edwards had been festering towards some kind of crisis, and there seems to have been some uncertainty over Jaeger's future as a staff writer; again he wondered whether coaching singers would be a more enjoyable way of supplementing his income. Then, with doubts exacerbated perhaps by the sheer distance between them, Jaeger accused Elgar of failing to correspond with him as much as with other critics such as Bennett, Pitt and Kalisch. Elgar robustly but affectionately denied the charge, and went on to confide over his failure to make progress with his symphony during the Italian holiday, although he hoped to produce a concert overture for the proposed Covent Garden Festival to be held in March. He returned to England at the beginning of February, staying with Frank Schuster in London, in order to accept an invitation to dine with the King and conduct the first Pomp and Circumstance March afterwards. Jaeger came to lunch that day, bringing some of the newly engraved full score of The Apostles, and the next day he received the first part of the new overture from Elgar, who then returned to Malvern. Jaeger wrote to advise him to discuss openly with Littleton an exclusive publishing contract which had been mooted, and then went on to apologise for a lapse of confidentiality over the non-appearance of the symphony; another glimpse of Jaeger the gossip, especially in the company of fellow-critics.
