The Britten–Pears School for Advanced Musical Studies was founded in 1977 in Aldeburgh, Suffolk, following the success both of the master classes held for singers by Peter Pears from 1972, and of the subsequent courses for string players. [1]
The School grew to offer a varied programme of practical and academic courses for young musicians and singers at the start of their professional career. Master classes have been taught by such distinguished visiting faculty members as Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Murray Perahia and Pierre Fournier.
The successor of the school, the Britten–Pears Young Artist Programme, continues to provide training for outstanding young professionals from around the world and also manages courses for the Britten-Pears Orchestra, formerly The Snape Maltings Training Orchestra. [1]
The contemporary composition and performance course was founded by Oliver Knussen and Colin Matthews in 1992. More recently there has been in addition a digital media course, called New Music/New Media. [2] In September 2012, the course was led by Rolf Wallin, Tansy Davies, and Alexander Refsum Jensenius, co-founder of the Oslo Laptop Orchestra.
String quartets come together each spring and present a weekly recital of "work-in-progress" at the Jubilee Hall, and in late summer the International Academy of String Quartets provides further opportunities for working on repertoire. Menahem Pressler, Pierre-Laurent Aimard and the Arditti Quartet have all taught masterclasses.
Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He was a central figure of 20th-century British music, with a range of works including opera, other vocal music, orchestral and chamber pieces. His best-known works include the opera Peter Grimes (1945), the War Requiem (1962) and the orchestral showpiece The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra (1945).
The Aldeburgh Festival of Music and the Arts is an English arts festival devoted mainly to classical music. It takes place each June in the town of Aldeburgh, Suffolk and is centred on Snape Maltings Concert Hall.
Stuart Oliver Knussen was a British composer and conductor.
Imogen Clare Holst was a British composer, arranger, conductor, teacher, musicologist, and festival administrator. The only child of the composer Gustav Holst, she is particularly known for her educational work at Dartington Hall in the 1940s, and for her 20 years as joint artistic director of the Aldeburgh Festival. In addition to composing music, she wrote composer biographies, much educational material, and several books on the life and works of her father.
Snape Maltings Concert Hall is an arts complex on the banks of the River Alde at Snape, Suffolk, England. It is best known as one of the main sites of the annual Aldeburgh Festival. It is now one of two headquarters for Britten Pears Arts, with the other being The Red House.
Simon Holt is an English composer.
Andrew Shulman is an English virtuoso cellist, conductor and composer. He is currently the principal cellist of the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra and maintains his cello studio at the University of Southern California's Thornton School of Music in Los Angeles, California.
Roger William Wright CBE is an English arts administrator. He is currently the Chief Executive of Britten Pears Arts.
Alasdair Tait is a Scottish cellist, teacher and artistic director who is the Chief Executive & Artistic Director of Young Classical Artists Trust. Tait previously recorded and toured with the Belcea Quartet, performed at music festivals, and judged music competitions.
Cecil Aronowitz was a British viola player, a founding member of the Melos Ensemble, a leading chamber musician, and an influential teacher at the Royal College of Music and the Royal Northern College of Music.
Rae Woodland was a British soprano who studied with Roy Henderson. Her debut was as Queen of the Night at Sadlers Wells. She sang in many European festivals, and debuted at Covent Garden in La sonnambula with Joan Sutherland and Luciano Pavarotti. She was first asked to sing for Benjamin Britten on the English Opera Group's tour of Russia, and played many roles for him subsequently. She also created roles for Gottfried von Einem, Nicholas Maw and Sir Arthur Bliss, and made many live broadcasts for the BBC, from the RAH Proms to Friday Night is Music Night. She retired from the opera stage in 1984. She then taught singing at the Royal Academy of Music in London, and at the Britten-Pears School in Snape Maltings on the invitation of Sir Peter Pears.
Nancy Evans OBE was an English mezzo-soprano who had a notable career as a concert and opera singer. She is particularly associated with Benjamin Britten who wrote his song cycle, A Charm of Lullabies, and the role of Nancy in his opera Albert Herring for her.
Andrew Hugh Michael Maguire was an Irish violinist, leader, concertmaster and principal player of the London Symphony Orchestra and the BBC Symphony Orchestra (1962–1967), leader of the Melos Ensemble and the Allegri Quartet, a professor at the Royal Academy of Music, and violin tutor to the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain.
The Britten-Pears Orchestra, formerly The Snape Maltings Training Orchestra, is the youth orchestra of the Britten-Pears Young Artists Programme at Snape Maltings, run by the Aldeburgh Festival.
Britten Pears Arts is a large music education organisation based in Suffolk, England. It aims to continue the legacy of composer Benjamin Britten and his partner, singer Peter Pears, and to promote the enjoyment and experience of music for all. It is a registered charity.
Michael Dussek is an English pianist specialising in chamber music and song accompaniment.
Joseph Phibbs is an English composer of orchestral, choral and chamber music. He has also composed for theatre, both in the UK and Japan. Since 1998 he has written regularly to commissions for Festivals, for private sponsors, and for the BBC, which has broadcast premieres of his orchestral and chamber works from the Proms and elsewhere. His works have been given premieres in Europe, the United States and the Far East, and he has received prestigious awards, including most recently a British Composer Award, and a Library of Congress Serge Koussevitzky Music Foundation Award. Many of his works have been premiered by leading international musicians, including Dame Evelyn Glennie, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Leonard Slatkin, Sakari Oramo, Vasily Petrenko, Gianandrea Noseda, and the Belcea Quartet.
Jonathan Alistair James Reekie is a British arts administrator who has been the Director of Somerset House Trust since 2014. During this time, the renovation of the historic site has been completed, including the launch of Somerset House Studios, helping to establish Somerset House as "London's Working Arts Centre", home to a creative community in central London. Reekie has overseen the expansion of the cultural programme, including PJ Harvey's Recording in Progress with Artangel, Björk Digital, Big Bang Data, Perfume, and Get Up, Stand Up Now. In 2019, Reekie co-curated with Sarah Cook the exhibition 24/7, a wake-up call to a non-stop world, based on the book by Jonathan Crary.
Canticle IV: The Journey of the Magi, Op. 86, is a composition for three male solo voices and piano by Benjamin Britten, part of his series of five Canticles. It sets the text of T. S. Eliot's poem "Journey of the Magi", retelling the story of the biblical Magi. The work was premiered in June 1971 at the Aldeburgh Festival by James Bowman, Peter Pears and John Shirley-Quirk, with Britten as the pianist. It was published the following year, dedicated to the three singers.
The Doric String Quartet is based in the UK and was formed in 1998. As of 2023, the members are Alex Redington and Ying Xue on violin, Hélène Clément on viola and John Myerscough on cello. Past members include Jonathan Stone, Simon Tandree and Chris Brown. In 2008, the quartet won first prize at the Osaka International Chamber Music Competition and second prize at the "Premio Paolo Borciani" International String Quartet Competition. Their repertoire includes Haydn, Beethoven, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Schumann, Bartók, Janáček, Korngold and Britten, as well as the work of contemporary composers such as John Adams, Thomas Adès and Brett Dean. They have given premieres of works by Dean, Peter Maxwell Davies and Donnacha Dennehy. The Doric is Teaching Quartet in Association with the Royal Academy of Music and artistic director of the Mendelssohn on Mull Festival. They have recorded for Chandos since 2009.
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