AS an 18 year-old involved in the Hereford music-making scene throughout my school career, having been a chorister in the cathedral choir and more recently having led the Herefordshire Youth Orchestra, the cult of Edward Elgar has always lurked near the surface.

Much is often made of Elgar's association with Hereford and the cathedral, and as a young chorister, primitive photographs of the man occupying the very space in which I found myself were the cause of brief excitement, to say nothing of the news that there are still elderly gentlemen in our midst who once sung beneath his baton.

In 2005, Elgar's local celebrity status seemed to have been unequivocally confirmed with the erection of his statue, staring with a look of perpetual vacancy across the cathedral close.

As a member of the Cathedral School Chamber Choir, I was the privileged beneficiary of the Elgar in Hereford Society from whom we received a very elegant gong in honour of our efforts at the Hereford Festival 2007, yet I still wonder at how easily one may get over-excited about such a man.

As a violinist, there is an undeniable thrill in wringing every drop of life from such rich melodies as you hear in his Pomp and Circumstance marches and, from the perspective of a young aspiring composer, his music, while sometimes a little predictable in my opinion, is evocative and reaches moments of intense passion.

But while the man is clearly due considerable respect (I should be more than happy to be recognised 150 years hence) in my opinion his achievement is sometimes unfairly amplified compared with the host of English composers whose work is denied the exultation that Sir Edward enjoys.

In conversation with my peers about famous English composers', Elgar was by far the most popular if not only choice.

Vaughan Williams and his association with Herefordshire was a complete enigma to most, while a Google search of Walton yielded in the first instance, unhelpful access to a purveyor of fine garden sheds and gazebos.

Nevertheless, to dwell forever on the merits of any one composer risks missing the point of music in the first place - a subjective experience designed to shed some light on the soul of its creator, and if Sir Edward could know what discussion his work has sparked over a century later, I'm sure he'd be content simply for us to take from it what we will.

Liam Dunachie, 18, lives in Ludlow and attends Hereford Cathedral School, where is his now taking his A-levels. He holds a piano performance diploma from Trinity College London and has been awarded a choral scholarship to read music at Trinity College, Cambridge, from 2008.