Elizabethan Serenade is a light music

Light music

Light music is a generic term applied to a mainly British musical style of "light" orchestral music, which originated in the 19th century and had its heyday during the early to mid part of the 20th century, although arguably it lasts to the present day....

 composition by Ronald Binge

Ronald Binge

Ronald Binge was a British composer and arranger of light music.-Biography:He was born in a working-class neighbourhood in Derby in the English Midlands. In his childhood he was a chorister at Saint Andrews Church , London Road, Derby - 'the railwaymens church'...

. When it was first played by the Mantovani

Mantovani

Annunzio Paolo Mantovani known as Mantovani, was an Anglo-Italian conductor and light orchestra-styled entertainer with a cascading strings musical signature. The book British Hit Singles & Albums states that he was "Britain's most successful album act before The Beatles .....

 orchestra in 1951, it was simply titled "Andante cantabile". The name was altered by the composer to reflect the optimism of the new Elizabethan age beginning with the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II

Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II

The Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II was the ceremony in which the newly ascended monarch, Elizabeth II, was crowned Queen of the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Ceylon, and Pakistan, as well as taking on the role of Head of the Commonwealth...

 in 1952.

The piece won Binge an Ivor Novello award and it also had chart success in Germany and South Africa. A version with lyrics by poet Christopher Hassall

Christopher Hassall

Christopher Vernon Hassall was an English actor, dramatist, librettist, lyricist and poet, who found his greatest fame in a memorable musical partnership with the actor and composer Ivor Novello after working together in the same touring company...

 called Where the Gentle Avon Flows was released and the work also had lyrics added in German, Norwegian, Swedish, Finnish, Dutch, Danish and French. The piece was used as the theme to Music In Miniature on the BBC Light Programme

BBC Light Programme

The Light Programme was a BBC radio station which broadcast mainstream light entertainment and music from 1945 until 1967, when it was rebranded as BBC Radio 2...

.

In 1970, a reggae

Reggae

Reggae is a music genre first developed in Jamaica in the late 1960s. While sometimes used in a broader sense to refer to most types of Jamaican music, the term reggae more properly denotes a particular music style that originated following on the development of ska and rocksteady.Reggae is based...

 version called Elizabethan Reggae by Boris Gardiner

Boris Gardiner

Boris Gardiner is a Jamaican singer, songwriter and bass guitarist.-Career:Gardiner performed on the tourist circuit for much of the 1960s and was a member of Carlos Malcolm & the Afro Caribs and Byron Lee's Dragonaires...

 & the Love People was released. (This was initially erroneously credited to the track's producer, Byron Lee and the Dragonaires).