From its first notes, Elgar's Introduction and Allegro, Op. 47 (1905), identifies itself as "open air" music. The orchestra, complemented by the gentler timbre of the string quartet, clearly lends itself to the composer's adoption of the Baroque concerto grosso form, though the composer makes no attempt to imitate earlier styles. The work's vitality and effect instead lie entirely in its overall freedom and imaginative sweep.

Elgar proved himself particularly adept in writing for strings in such works as the Serenade, Op. 20 (1892), the "Enigma" Variations, Op. 36 (1898-1899), and his symphonies. In the Introduction and Allegro, he replaces intimacy and intricacy with bold, song-like melodies that evolve into a clearly defined structure. The string writing falls so felicitously under the players' fingers and bows that the work is just as popular with performers as it is with audiences.

The bold, formal introduction is followed by a striking contrast of mood in a wistful tune with more than a hint of Celtic twilight. The composer found innocent pleasure in puzzles of all kinds, and wrote of hearing the melody as "distant singing" while on holiday in Wales; however, there is no further evidence of its origin. The tune is variously expanded throughout—at one point it becomes part of a decidedly unacademic fugue—in a manner that might have seemed prosaic in less capable hands. The work is crowned by final, thrilling, seemingly inevitable tutti return of the "Welsh" tune.

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