Robert Gilbert of the Elgar Society has asked me to pass this on from the
Elgar Society web site:

   http://www.elgar.org/1news.htm

The death of Lord Menuhin on the morning of 12 March, while on tour in
Berlin with the Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra, deprives the Elgar Society
of a long-serving and much loved President.  Another of the diminishing
number of people who were personally acquainted with Elgar has gone.  Among
the many things for which he will be remembered - his career as virtuoso
violinist and, later, as conductor; the recordings he leaves behind; his
lasting influence on many young violinists, not least through the school
he founded in Surrey and continued to play an active part in right up to
his death - it is his superlative recording of the Elgar violin concerto,
conducted by the composer, which stands out clearly for the vast majority
of Elgarians.  Lord Menuhin's funeral, in the grounds of his school where
he is now buried, was a private occasion, but a public memorial service is
planned for Westminster Abbey.

Lord Menuhin's sudden death, after 16 years as the Society's President,
leaves the Society looking for a worthy successor, only the third in the
Society's history.  (Lord Menuhin succeeded Sir Adrian Boult, instigator
of the Society and its first President).  There is no obvious front-runner
among the Society's Vice Presidents.  If you have a view on whom the
Society's new President should be, why not write to Robert Gilbert,
editor of The Apostle's letter page -

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The current Vice Presidents of the Elgar Society are

Sir Colin Davis
Sir Charles Mackerras
Dame Janet Baker
Vernon Handley
Richard Hickox
Leonard Slatkin
Professor Ian Parrott
Sir David Willcocks
Percy Young
Diana McVeagh
Michael Kennedy
Jerrold Northrop Moore
Michael Pope
Lady Evelyn Barbirolli
Wulstan Atkins
Robert Anderson
June, Marchioness of Aberdeen

Tony Duggan
Staffordshire,
United Kingdom.