What is Birmingham Triennial Music Festival?
[[File:Birmingham Town Hall from Chamberlain Square.jpg|right|thumb|[[Birmingham Town Hall]] where the festival was held from 1837]] [[File:Birm1.png|thumb|Birmingham Triennial Music Festival, Town Hall 1834]] [[File:Birmingham Town Hall interior 1845.jpg|thumb|Birmingham Triennial Music Festival, Town Hall 1845]] The '''Birmingham Triennial Musical Festival''' was a festival of [[classical music]] that used to be held in [[Birmingham]], [[England]]. It was started in [[1784]] and continued until [[1912]]. “Triennial” means that it happened once every three years. ==History== The first music festival was held for three days in September 1768. It helped to raise money to complete the new General Hospital on Summer Lane. Another festival was held in 1778 to get more money. The hospital opened in September 1779. From September 1784 the festival was held every three years. It continued to raise money for the hospital. The church and theatre where the festival was held became too small, so in [[1834]] they built [[Birmingham Town Hall]] which had much more room. Many famous musicians performed at the festival. In 1837 [[Felix Mendelssohn]] conducted a performance of his [[oratorio]] ''St. Paul'', played the [[pipe organ|organ]], and played the piano part in the first performance of his Piano Concerto No. 2 which had been especially [[commission]]ed by the Festival. In the next festival he played his Piano Concerto No. 1. In [[1846]] (a year before he died) the festival commissioned him to write his oratorio ''[[Elijah (oratorio)|Elijah]]''. It was a huge success. He was paid 200 [[guinea (British coin)|guineas]]. ''Elijah'' was played at every festival after that. The festival commissioned other composers to write works, these included: [[Arthur Sullivan]], [[Max Bruch]], [[Charles Gounod]] and [[Antonín Dvořák]]. The great conductor [[Hans Richter]] was made principal [[Conducting|conductor]] in [[1885]]. [[Edward Elgar]] wrote several works for the festival. In [[1900]] his oratorio ''[[The Drea