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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 War Requiem, Op. 66, is a large-scale setting of the Requiem composed by Benjamin Britten mostly in 1961 and completed in January 1962. The War Requiem was performed for the consecration of the new Coventry Cathedral, which was built after the original fourteenth-century structure was destroyed in a World War II bombing raid. The traditional Latin texts are interspersed, in telling juxtaposition, with extra-liturgical poems by Wilfred Owen, written during World War I.
Sir Peter Neville Luard Pears was an English tenor. His career was closely associated with the composer Benjamin Britten, his personal and professional partner for nearly forty years.
Sir Lennox Randal Francis Berkeley was an English composer.
Noye's Fludde is a one-act opera by the British composer Benjamin Britten, intended primarily for amateur performers, particularly children. First performed on 18 June 1958 at that year's Aldeburgh Festival, it is based on the 15th-century Chester "mystery" or "miracle" play which recounts the Old Testament story of Noah's Ark. Britten specified that the opera should be staged in churches or large halls, not in a theatre.
Sinfonia da Requiem, Op. 20, for orchestra is a symphony written by Benjamin Britten in 1940 at the age of 26. It was one of several works commissioned from different composers by the Japanese government to mark Emperor Jimmu's 2600th anniversary of the founding of the Japanese Empire. The Japanese government rejected the Sinfonia for its use of Latin titles from the Catholic Requiem for its three movements and for its somber overall character, but it was received positively at its world premiere in New York on 29 March 1941 under John Barbirolli. A performance in Boston under Serge Koussevitzky led to the commission of the opera Peter Grimes from the Koussevitzky Music Foundations.
Hymn to St Cecilia, Op. 27 is a choral piece by Benjamin Britten (1913–1976), a setting of a poem by W. H. Auden written between 1940 and 1942. Auden's original title was "Three Songs for St. Cecilia's Day", and he later published the poem as "Anthem for St. Cecilia’s Day ".
Winter Words, Op. 52, is a song cycle for tenor and piano by Benjamin Britten. Written in 1953, it sets eight poems by Thomas Hardy. Winter Words is one of Britten's few compositions from the period after the premiere of his opera Gloriana; the cycle is named after Hardy's last published collection, but the poems are from different parts of Hardy's collected poems. The cycle was premiered at the Leeds Festival in October 1953, with Peter Pears singing and Britten at the piano. It was dedicated to John and Myfanwy Piper.
Canticle III: Still falls the rain is a piece by English composer Benjamin Britten. It is part of Britten's series of Five Canticles.
Sacred and Profane, Op. 91, is a collection of 'Eight Medieval Lyrics' for unaccompanied voices in five parts (SSATB) composed by Benjamin Britten in 1975.
A Birthday Hansel, Op. 92, is a song cycle for 'high voice' and harp composed by Benjamin Britten and set to texts by Robert Burns. The last song cycle that Britten wrote, it was composed in honour of the Queen Mother's 75th birthday, at the request of her daughter, Elizabeth II.
A Charm of Lullabies, Op.41 is a song cycle for mezzo-soprano with piano accompaniment by Benjamin Britten. It consists of five songs composed on poems by William Blake, Robert Burns, Robert Greene, Thomas Randolph and John Phillip. It was written in 1947 for Nancy Evans, who gave the first performance with Felix de Nobel (piano) at a festival in The Hague 3 January 1948. The score was first published in 1949 by Boosey and Hawkes in London.
Seven Sonnets of Michelangelo is a song cycle composed by Benjamin Britten (1913–76) for tenor voice and piano in 1940, and published as his Op. 22. It was written for himself and his life-partner, the tenor Peter Pears (1910–86). The manuscripts of the songs are dated between April and October 1940; but there is some evidence that the cycle had been contemplated, and even begun, as early as 1937. It consists of settings of seven sonnets, all love songs, by the Italian painter and poet Michelangelo (1475–1564), in the original language:
- XVI: "Si come nella penna e nell'inchiostro"
- XXXI: "A che più debb'io mai l'intensa voglia"
- XXX: "Veggio co' bei vostri occhi un dolce lume"
- LV: "Tu sa, ch'io so, signor mie, che tu sai"
- XXXVIII: "Rendete agli occhi miei, o fonte o fiume"
- XXXII: "S'un casto amor, s'una pietà superna"
- XXIV: "Spirto ben nato, in cui si specchia e vede"
Songs and Proverbs of William Blake is a song cycle composed by Benjamin Britten (1913–76) in 1965 for baritone voice and piano and published as his Op. 74. The published score states that the words were "selected by Peter Pears" from Proverbs of Hell, Auguries of Innocence and Songs of Experience by William Blake (1757–1827). It was premiered at the Aldeburgh Festival in June 1965 by the German baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau (1925–2012) and the composer. The critic William Mann thought that the cycle would be judged "Britten's deepest and most subtle song-cycle"; and John Warrack wrote in The Daily Telegraph that Britten "has, I feel, here come to terms with the darkness and sense of cruelty that has always stalked his art".
The Poet's Echo is a song cycle composed by Benjamin Britten (1913–76) in August 1965 during a holiday visit to the Soviet Union, in Dilizhan, Armenia. It consists of settings for high voice and piano of six poems by the Russian poet Alexandr Pushkin (1799–1837), in their original language. It was published as his Op. 76.
Sechs Hölderlin-Fragmente is a song cycle for high voice and piano composed in 1958 by Benjamin Britten (1913–76), and published as his Op. 61. It consists of settings of six short poems and verse fragments by the German lyric poet Friedrich Hölderlin (1770–1843).
Who Are These Children? is a song cycle for tenor and piano composed in 1969 by Benjamin Britten (1913–76), and published as his Op. 84. It consists of settings of twelve poems by the Scottish poet William Soutar (1898–1943).
Beware! Three Early Songs is a song cycle for voice and piano composed by Benjamin Britten and set to texts by Herbert Asquith, Robert Burns and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
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 was premiered in June 1971 at the Aldeburgh Festival.
References
- ↑ Anderson, David (March 8, 2005). BRITTEN: Canticles I–V, The Heart of the Matter. Opera Today
- ↑ Evans, Peter (1996). The Music of Benjamin Britten, p. 402. Clarendon Press, ISBN 978-0-19-816590-3
- ↑ Ford, Boris (1996). Benjamin Britten's poets: the poetry he set to music. Carcanet, ISBN 978-1-85754-022-2
- ↑ Seymour, Claire (2007). The operas of Benjamin Britten: expression and evasion. Boydell Press, ISBN 978-1-84383-314-7
- ↑ Johnson, Graham; Odam, George (2003). Britten, voice, & piano: Lectures on the vocal music of Benjamin Britten. Ashgate, ISBN 978-0-7546-3872-8
- ↑ Craggs, Stewart R. (2002). Benjamin Britten: a bio-bibliography. Greenwood Publishing Group, ISBN 978-0-313-29531-7
