Elijah (oratorio) Austrian bass Joseph Staudigl. Mendelssohn had discussed an oratorio based on Elijah in the late 1830s with his friend Karl Klingemann, who had provided him with the libretto for his comic operetta "Die Heimkehr aus der Fremde", which resulted in a partial text that Klingemann was unable to finish. Mendelssohn then turned to , the librettist for his earlier oratorio "St. Paul", who quickly abandoned Klingemann's work and produced his own text that combined the story of Elijah as told in the Book of Kings with psalms. In 1845, the Birmingham Festival commissioned an oratorio from Mendelssohn, who worked with
Paul Edwards (composer) Paul Edwards (composer) Paul Christison Edwards (born ) is an English organist and composer of music for the Anglican Church. Paul Edwards was brought up in the village of Turvey in Bedfordshire and educated at St Paul’s Choir School and Bedford Modern School. He was a chorister at St Paul’s Cathedral for four and a half years and then spent an equal amount of time as lay clerk at Peterborough Cathedral. He has served as organist and choir master at several churches in Bedfordshire, including All Saints, Turvey and St. Paul's Church, Bedford. He is also active as a teacher,