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Home , Bury Me Here, Curlew River, The Rape of Lucretia

4 And both would seem to anticipate that late four years the triumph of son. How much can by grief perhaps, in search of her abducted Roman tyrant; Japanese mother, maddened A virtuous wife raped by the vicious son of a works, he is also, perhaps, a child of his time; constitutes music drama in both of these If Britten intends to revise our notion of what the dominant Western tradition of Christianity. medieval Japan. Yet both set their stories within it: to Rome when it was ruled by kings and to at the edge of the Western tradition or outside after the composer had demonstrated (in and, perhaps, the function of music drama works share is a desire to rethink both the form masterpiece and More significantly, both within the tradition of European scale works which sit relatively comfortably The Turn of the Screw But look and listen again. work that begins and ends with plainchant. performed by a cast of medieval monks in a the history of the Madwoman in ideas about suffering and redemption, and her rape and eventual suicide to Christian of the chorus in Christian framework, with the man and woman both works tell their tales within a specifically ‘A as an opera, while directions. Then ’s interests moved in different performances of each work, during which time there’s a span of 18 years between the first Curlew River Performance Church for Parable River:A Curlew Britten Benjamin

Parable for Church Performance’. It’s true that Curlew River was composed hot on the heels of was first performed in 1964, have in common? For a start , Peter Grimes Lucretia A look to cultures that are either

Midsummer Night’s Dream Curlew River The Rape of Lucretia ) his mastery of larger- struggling to relate The Rape of Lucretia The Rape of in 1945, while , . What all three was subtitled Curlew River (1964) (1964) is described . and and

. (1913–76) largely for personal and political reasons, journey to America in 1939 may have been to study with Alban Berg in Vienna. His excited by the music of Mahler he had hoped beyond his native shores. As a young man Britten was always alert to creative worlds into the heart of the city to ravish Lucretia. must ride from his army camp outside Rome River, while in the Tarquinius and the Traveller being ferried across the Curlew action of the church parable has the Madwoman between these two worlds. So the principal ‘performance’ may be said to act as a bridge together within the performance itself. Indeed present in each work and are somehow brought West; both are simultaneously and separately the European past and present or and Lucretia probably best. However, neither set in train by the Enlightenment, that West was other cultures, was grounded in the tradition an artist who, for all his deep curiosity about to the Japanese. It was, a court official told memory of his parents, was unacceptable work – of the Japanese empire. Britten’s resulting the 2,600th anniversary of the founding had been invited to write a piece celebrating (including Richard Strauss and Jacques Ibert) 26, he and five other European composers not been a happy one. In 1940, at the age of the composer’s relationship with Japan had NHK and the British Council. Up to this point perform in Tokyo by the Japanese broadcaster his partner , had been invited to In February of that year Britten, together with own music after a holiday to Bali in 1956. would become such a distinct accent in his encountered the music of the gamelan, which culture. Indeed, it was in the USA that he first becoming a part of a different musical but he evidently relished the possibility of nor Curlew River attempts to synthesise – composed in The Rape of is not the most yielding of theatrical forms who was thus imprisoned in his own chastity. and a man overwhelmingly attracted to boys criminal offence for almost all of his adult life art: the homosexual in a society where it was a Britten’s own personal life as well as that of his the self and the other as the central motif of much effort to see this fascination between patrimony and its ‘other’. And it doesn’t require of creative bridges between his own cultural to appeal to an English composer in search roots in a traditional form of Japanese theatre Here was a story that stretched out from its which every Western artist can learn from.’ with the … universality of the story is something the drama like a great Greek tragedy coupled selflessness of the acting, the perfect shaping of the haunting sounds. The deep solemnity and poem and we soon became accustomed to having an excellent literal translation of the of chanting used. But we were fortunate in language and especially the curious kind Of course it was strange to start with, the the greatest theatrical experiences of my life. [the performance of had seen that day in a talk for NHK. ‘I count Two years later Britten reflected on what he again on the day that he was to leave Japan. a year before that he asked to see the play land in search of a son who had been abducted the story of the madwoman who has travelled the the noh play something of an epiphany at a performance of the composer seems to have experienced gagaku, Japanese court music. On 11 kabuki and noh theatre and a performance of recitals of traditional geisha singing, visits to themselves in traditional Japanese culture, with In the meantime the two men were steeping the first time in Japan, the illuminations Symphony Orchestra in a performance of Nine days later Britten conducted the NHK composer’s arrangements of British folk songs. Sonnets of Michelangelo and Pears gave a recital that included the Matters were much improved in 1956. Britten to celebrate the birthday of a dynasty. him, unsuitably Christian and too ‘gloomy’ have difficulties with this form of drama, which for a Western audience; indeed, many Japanese , with Pears as the soloist, and, for Sumidagawa Sumidagawa together with the Sinfonia da Requiem . So moved was he by ] among

February Seven Les . Sumidagawa the composer to Plomer makes . ‘The rather than a definite project as a letter from two years later in 1958 it was an ‘idea’ the libretto for what became with the poet , who would write shared his excitement about what he had seen It seems likely that on his return to Europe Britten different in that the son is already dead. At the who then recovers her sanity. or lover eventually restored to the woman, with the lost child or the vanished husband Generally these stories have a happy ending, plays called kyo¯ jomono (drama of madwomen). the Kanze school of noh. It belongs to a group of in the particular play that he saw performed by flautist and three drummers. He was also lucky the onstage musicians – just four of – a the actors wearing their all-important masks and have appealed to Britten. The chanting chorus, The ritual element in noh undoubtedly would world with the other dimension is represented.’ , is ‘a sacred space where the meeting of our stage, which, as another commentator reminds and action are scarcely present on the noh the very springs of human emotion.’ Character ultimately to transcend the particular and touch divert on the surface but to move profoundly and theatre has written, ‘the purpose of noh is not to ritual. As Donald Keene, a historian of Japanese and those who are watching. Noh is a kind of minutes is a challenge for both the performer An actor sitting still and silent on stage for 90 company of Mozart, Verdi, Wagner or Berg. more challenging than an evening spent in the actors and audiences that are a great deal noh with western opera. It makes demands on without study – it would be wrong to equate in a Japanese that is not easily understood in noh and its starting-point is a text – albeit although music and dance play a central role can trace its roots back to the 14th century. And a curiously moving and disturbing story?’ that I am determined to do sometime. Isn’t it something that I am deeply interested in and talk about it can be brought forth again. It is But any time that you feel that you’d like to plans. I’d rather put it to the back of my mind. a drama of madness – sorrowing mother in what is sometimes called abiding theme in his work – as he was by the much moved by the death of innocence – an and see his spirit. Britten must have been as end the madwoman can only hear his voice doesn’t come into any immediate monoguruinoh Curlew River Sumidagawa . . But is

5 Programme notes 6 sound than the Japanese hayashi ensemble. four, and who produce a more highly coloured accompanied by seven musicians rather than is an essential part of noh drama, they are us to the kind of monophonic singing that static as in noh; and while the chorus still treat characters ‘act’ their emotions and are rarely are also masked; in this church parable the Curlew River noh only the protagonist wears a mask but in distanced itself from its noh origins. In As drama indicated in the preface to the published score. piece may be said to have grown’, as Britten Te lucis ante terminum So the piece begins with the plainsong hymn monks in order to instruct their congregation. church in East Anglia by an abbot and his a parable to be performed in a medieval framework is created, with the play becoming It’s at this point that the specifically Christian became curlews, giving the work its final title. miyakodori So they dropped the Japanese names, and Western pastiche of a Japanese noh play. were anxious that they might be creating a to create the role of the Madwoman, It seems likely that Britten and Pears, who was stage the work was called use the words of a Buddhist prayer. At this the mother and the chorus pray for him they of the dead child actually appears and when of the drama proper. As for the end, the spirit and their formal robing prior to the beginning the Ferryman rather than the entry of the monks names retained and the story beginning with it’s still very Japanese, with Japanese place language version of the original play. And its final form at this stage, being an English- points out that the work is a long way from Daisaku Mukai, who has studied this first draft, the summer of 1958 there was a draft libretto. importantly, to start writing. So by the end of Plomer did Curlew River want to talk about it and, more – the Japanese word for gulls – , the Ferryman and the Traveller , and ‘from it the whole would seem to have Sumida River . other, the Eastern Fens’. East Anglia certainly, us. ‘On this side the Land of the West, on the between ‘two kingdoms’, as the Ferryman tells that must be crossed, Parable for Church Performance runs a river and its meanings. Through the heart of this calling cards, they are intrinsic to Britten’s work these things into their score as so many exotic Whereas other composers might have written suitable for the visionary nature of the piece.’ delayed to create a kind of echo-like effect by all the instruments but each line is slightly the opening plainchant theme is played in unison of the Abbot after the prelude. In this entry music traditional music – we hear this in the entrance River characterises the musical language of As Daisaku Mukai has suggested, ‘heterophony played on the chamber organ in adapted what he heard on the sho to be plays complex chords. Britten seems to have has 17 bamboo pipes and in court music it of mouth organ used in gagaku. The sho that Britten acquired his own sho, a kind in Tokyo. And it was in the Japanese capital Japanese court music which he had heard of the drums seem to come from gagaku, the and the gradually accelerating The very particular use of the chamber organ wonderfully bent to his own creative purposes. Britten heard in Japan in 1956, though always hear unmistakable echoes of the music that However, when you listen to held in balance in the moment of performance. English Fens. East and West, other and self, are representing the soaring curlew, belongs to the sound strikingly Japanese, while the solo flute, guardian angels, the stately progressing chords Angelos the chorus chant drama. And when we are almost at the end, as … all these things are written into the monks too, darkness and light, despair and hope but also it’s the Japanese other, life and death [and] is also common to Japanese , the hymn for Vespers for the feast of the Custodes hominum psallimus Curlew River Curlew River tremolando Curlew River. , a frontier Curlew , you

from his near the Black Mountains. The with a vicious master who had kidnapped him One year ago, a young boy arrived in the area in memory of a sad event.’ He continues poling. ‘is an important day, the people are assembling poling his boat. ‘Today’, he tells his passengers As they begin their crossing, the Ferryman stops pilgrims persuade him to give her passage. and they argue. However, the Traveller and the seems unwilling to take her across the water abducted 12 months previously. The Ferryman Black Mountains in search of her child, who was clearly nobly born, has journeyed from the the Eastern Fens.’ The Madwoman, who is on this side the land of the West, on the other cross the river that ‘flows between two realms, The Traveller and the Madwoman have come to pilgrims take their places and the story begins. are ceremonially dressed in their robes, the Ferryman, the Traveller and the Madwoman River … in our reedy Fens … [where] the ago when ‘a sign was given of God’s grace abbot tells his congregation of a time not long their places and at a cue from the organ the abbot, his monks and the musicians take singing the hymn monks processing into the centre of the church Curlew River Fenlands in the early medieval period. takes place in a church by a river in the Eight pilgrims form the chorus. The action Ferryman, the Traveller and the Madwoman. men: the Abbot, who is the narrator, the who in the tradition of noh theatre are all The parable is told by a quartet of characters Synopsis runs.’ The monks who are to play the opens with the Abbot and his Te lucis ante terminum. Curlew The emblematic ‘Amen’, the final note of which Mother kneels in a prayer that ends with a joyous from her grief and with her wits restored, the blessed day we shall meet in heaven.’ Freed mother. The dead shall rise again and in that the spirit of her son. ‘Go your way in peace, Angelos echoes their chant, As all pray the voice of the dead boy suddenly grief-stricken mother to her son’s tomb. is ended.’ And he and the Pilgrims lead the Ferryman tries to console her. ‘Your sad search hope is swept away.’ During the crossing, the ‘O Curlew River, cruel Curlew, where all my son for whom the Madwoman is searching. All now understand the boy who died is the is there, to heal the in body and in soul'. boy’s grave is sacred, ‘… some special grace me.’ For the people who live along the river the my grave, and plant a yew tree in memory of country pass this way, their shadows will fall on to this chapel. Then, if travellers from my dear last request. ‘Please bury me here, by the path for the sick child, who, clearly dying, made a abandoned by the river. Local people cared boy was badly beaten by this master and then Programme note and Synopsis © Christopher Cook singing the hymn from the centre of the church once again the Abbot. And the company process away ‘In hope, in peace, ends our mystery’, intones as monks now hail ‘a sign of God’s grace.’ The actors in the drama are disrobed and cast – a signal of her return and acceptance. resolves into a long-delayed unison with the full . now, the mother suddenly sees Te lucis ante terminum Custodes hominum psallimus .

7 Synopsis