The English composer Edward Elgar wrote many large-scale works, including two symphonies and concertos for violin and cello. His orchestral Variations on an Original Theme (‘Enigma’), Op. 36, was the work that established his reputation as a major composer. In it, he composed musical portraits of thirteen of his friends (and one of his wife, Alice), ending with a self-portrait. The whole is based on a mysterious theme, the meaning of which has been the subject of endless speculation. This variation represents Isabel Fitton, an amateur violist and pupil of Elgar’s who struggled with string-crossing, and hence the little figure on which this piece is based. Elgar liked to disguise the identity of the friends depicted in the ‘Enigma’ Variations, hence the different spelling given to Isabel’s name.