Benjamin Britten

“Britten” redirects here. For other uses, see Britten the operas are the struggle of an outsider against a hostile (disambiguation). society, and the corruption of innocence. Britten’s other works range from orchestral to choral, solo vocal, chamber and instrumental as well as film mu- sic. He took a great interest in writing music for chil- dren and amateur performers, including the opera Noye’s Fludde, a Missa Brevis, and the song collection Friday Af- ternoons. He often composed with particular performers in mind. His most frequent and important muse was his personal and professional partner, the tenor Peter Pears; others included Kathleen Ferrier, Jennifer Vyvyan, Janet Baker, Dennis Brain, Julian Bream, Dietrich Fischer- Dieskau and Mstislav Rostropovich. Britten was a cel- ebrated pianist and conductor, performing many of his own works in concert and on record. He also per- formed and recorded works by others, such as Bach's Brandenburg concertos, Mozart symphonies, and song cy- cles by Schubert and Schumann. Together with Pears and the librettist and producer Eric Crozier, Britten founded the annual Aldeburgh Festival in 1948, and he was responsible for the creation of Snape Maltings concert hall in 1967. In his last year, he was the first composer to be given a life peerage.

Britten in the mid-1960s (photograph by Hans Wild) 1 Life and career

Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH 1.1 Early years (22 November 1913 – 4 December 1976) was an English composer, conductor and pianist. He was a central fig- ure of 20th-century British classical 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). Born in Suffolk, the son of a dentist, Britten showed tal- ent from an early age. He studied at the Royal College of Music in London and privately with the composer Frank Bridge. Britten first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy was Born in 1934. With the premiere of Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to international fame. Over the next 28 years, he wrote 14 more operas, establishing himself as one of the leading 20th-century composers in the genre. In addition to large-scale operas Britten’s birthplace in Lowestoft, which was the Britten family for Sadler’s Wells and Covent Garden, he wrote “cham- home for over twenty years ber operas” for small forces, suitable for performance in venues of modest size. Among the best known of these Britten was born in the fishing port of Lowestoft in is The Turn of the Screw (1954). Recurring themes in Suffolk, on the east coast of England on 22 November

1 2 1 LIFE AND CAREER

1913,[1] the feast day of Saint Cecilia.[2] He was the Britten was outraged at the severe corporal punishments youngest of four children of Robert Victor Britten (1878– frequently handed out, and later he said that his life- 1934) and his wife Edith Rhoda, née Hockey (1874– long pacifism probably had its roots in his reaction to 1937).[n 1] Robert Britten’s youthful ambition to become the regime at the school.[19] He himself rarely fell foul of a farmer had been thwarted by lack of capital, and he Sewell, a mathematician, in which subject Britten was a had instead trained as a dentist, a profession he prac- star pupil. The school had no musical tradition, and Brit- tised successfully but without pleasure. While studying at ten continued to study the piano with Ethel Astle. From Charing Cross Hospital in London he met Edith Hockey, the age of ten he took viola lessons from a friend of his the daughter of a junior Home Office official. They were mother’s, Audrey Alston, who had been a professional married in September 1901 at St John’s, Smith Square, player before her marriage.[20] In his spare time he com- London.[4] posed prolifically. When his Simple Symphony, based on The consensus among biographers of Britten is that his these juvenilia, was recorded in 1956, Britten wrote this pen-portrait of his young self for the sleeve note: father was a loving but somewhat stern and remote parent.[5] Britten, according to his sister Beth, “got on well with him and shared his wry sense of humour, ded- Once upon a time there was a prep-school [6] ication to work and capacity for taking pains”. Edith boy. ... He was quite an ordinary little boy ... Britten was a talented amateur musician and secretary of he loved cricket, only quite liked football (al- [7] the Lowestoft Musical Society. In the English provinces though he kicked a pretty “corner”); he adored of the early 20th century, distinctions of social class were mathematics, got on all right with history, was taken very seriously. Britten described his family as scared by Latin Unseen; he behaved fairly well, “very ordinary middle class”, but there were aspects of only ragged the recognised amount, so that his the Brittens that were not ordinary: Edith’s father was contacts with the cane or the slipper were hap- illegitimate, and her mother was an alcoholic; Robert pily rare (although one nocturnal expedition to Britten was an agnostic and refused to attend church stalk ghosts left its marks behind); he worked [8] on Sundays. Music was the principal means by which his way up the school slowly and steadily, un- Edith Britten strove to maintain the family’s social stand- til at the age of thirteen he reached that pin- ing, inviting the pillars of the local community to musical nacle of importance and grandeur never to be [9] soirées at the house. quite equalled in later days: the head of the When Britten was three months old he contracted pneu- Sixth, head-prefect, and Victor Ludorum. But monia and nearly died.[10] The illness left him with a – there was one curious thing about this boy: he damaged heart,[11] and doctors warned his parents that he wrote music. His friends bore with it, his ene- would probably never be able to lead a normal life.[12] He mies kicked a bit but not for long (he was quite recovered more fully than expected, and as a boy was a tough), the staff couldn't object if his work and keen tennis player and cricketer.[13] To his mother’s great games didn't suffer. He wrote lots of it, reams [21] delight he was an outstandingly musical child, unlike his and reams of it. sisters, who inherited their father’s indifference to music, while his brother, though musically talented, was inter- ested only in ragtime.[14] Edith gave the young Britten his first lessons in piano and notation. He made his first at- tempts at composition when he was five.[15] He started pi- ano lessons when he was seven years old, and three years later began to play the viola.[16] He was one of the last composers brought up on exclusively live music: his fa- ther refused to have a gramophone or, later, a radio in the house.[9]

1.2 Education

1.2.1 Lowestoft

When he was seven Britten was sent to a dame school, run by the Misses Astle. The younger sister, Ethel, gave him piano lessons; in later life he said that he remained grateful for the excellence of her teaching.[17] The follow- ing year he moved on to his prep school, South Lodge, Lowestoft, as a day boy.[18] The headmaster, Thomas Sewell, was an old-fashioned disciplinarian; the young Frank Bridge, Britten’s teacher 1.3 Early professional life 3

Audrey Alston encouraged Britten to go to symphony In September 1928 Britten went as a boarder to concerts in Norwich. At one of these, during the triennial Gresham’s School, in Holt, Norfolk. At the time he felt Norfolk and Norwich Festival on 30 October 1924,[22] he unhappy there, even writing in his diary of contemplat- heard Frank Bridge's orchestral poem The Sea, conducted ing suicide or running away:[30] he hated being separated by the composer. It was the first substantial piece of mod- from his family, most particularly from his mother; he ern music he had ever encountered,[23] and he was, in his despised the music master; and he was shocked at the own phrase, “knocked sideways”.[24] Audrey Alston was prevalence of bullying, though he was not the target of a friend of Bridge; when he returned to Norwich for the it.[31][n 3] He remained there for two years and in 1930, next festival in 1927 she brought her not quite 14-year- he won a composition scholarship at the Royal College old pupil to meet him. Bridge was impressed with the of Music (RCM) in London; his examiners were the boy, and after they had gone through some of Britten’s composers John Ireland and Ralph Vaughan Williams compositions together he invited him to come to London and the college’s harmony and counterpoint teacher, S P to take lessons from him.[25] Robert Britten, supported by Waddington.[33] Thomas Sewell, doubted the wisdom of pursuing a com- Britten was at the RCM from 1930 to 1933, studying posing career; a compromise was agreed by which Britten composition with Ireland and piano with Arthur Ben- would, as planned, go on to his public school the follow- jamin. He won the Sullivan Prize for composition, the ing year but would make regular day-trips to London to Cobbett Prize for chamber music, and was twice winner study composition with Bridge and piano with his col- [34] [26] of the Ernest Farrar Prize for composition. These hon- league Harold Samuel. ours notwithstanding, he was not greatly impressed by the Bridge impressed on Britten the importance of scrupu- establishment: he found his fellow-students “amateurish lous attention to the technical craft of composing[n 2] and and folksy” and the staff “inclined to suspect technical the maxim that “you should find yourself and be true to brilliance of being superficial and insincere”.[35][n 4] An- what you found.”[28] The earliest substantial works Brit- other Ireland pupil, the composer Humphrey Searle, said ten composed while studying with Bridge are the String that Ireland could be “an inspiring teacher to those on Quartet in F, completed in April 1928, and the Qua- his own wavelength"; Britten was not, and learned lit- tre Chansons Françaises, a song-cycle for high voice and tle from him.[37] He continued to study privately with orchestra. Authorities differ on the extent of Bridge’s Bridge,[38] although he later praised Ireland for “nurs[ing] influence on his pupil’s technique. Humphrey Carpen- me very gently through a very, very difficult musical ter and Michael Oliver judge that Britten’s abilities as adolescence”.[38] an orchestrator were essentially self-taught;[29] Donald Britten also used his time in London to attend con- Mitchell considers that Bridge had an important influence certs and become better acquainted with the music on the cycle.[28] of Stravinsky, Shostakovich and, most particularly, Mahler.[n 5] He intended postgraduate study in Vienna with Alban Berg, Arnold Schoenberg's student, but was 1.2.2 Public school and Royal College of Music eventually dissuaded by his parents, on the advice of the RCM staff.[40] The first of Britten’s compositions to attract wide atten- tion were composed while at the RCM: the Sinfonietta, Op. 1 (1932), and a set of choral variations A Boy was Born, written in 1933 for the BBC Singers, who first per- formed it the following year.[41] In this same period he wrote Friday Afternoons, a collection of 12 songs for the pupils of Clive House School, Prestatyn, where his brother was headmaster.[42]

1.3 Early professional life

In February 1935, at Bridge’s instigation, Britten was in- vited to a job interview by the BBC's director of music Adrian Boult and his assistant Edward Clark.[43] Britten was not enthusiastic about the prospect of working full- time in the BBC music department and was relieved when what came out of the interview was an invitation to write the score for a documentary film, The King’s Stamp, di- [44] Early influences, clockwise from top left: Mahler, Ireland, rected by Alberto Cavalcanti for the GPO Film Unit. Shostakovich, Stravinsky Britten became a member of the film unit’s small group 4 1 LIFE AND CAREER

Pears. Although Britten was extraordinarily devoted to his mother and was devastated at her death, it also seems to have been something of a liberation for him.[50] Only after that did he begin to engage in emotional relation- ships with people his own age or younger.[51] Later in the year he got to know Pears while they were both helping to clear out the country cottage of a mutual friend who had died in an air crash.[52] Pears quickly became Brit- ten’s musical inspiration and close (though for the mo- ment platonic) friend. Britten’s first work for him was composed within weeks of their meeting, a setting of Emily Brontë's poem, “A thousand gleaming fires”, for tenor and strings.[53] During 1937 Britten composed a Pacifist March to words by Ronald Duncan for the Peace Pledge Union, of which, as a pacifist, he had become an active member; the work was not a success and was soon withdrawn.[54] The best known of his compositions from this period is proba- bly Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge for string or- chestra, described by Matthews as the first of Britten’s works to become a popular classic.[55] It was a success in North America, with performances in Toronto, New York, Boston, Chicago and San Francisco, under conduc- tors including John Barbirolli and Serge Koussevitzky.[56]

1.4 America 1939–42

In April 1939 Britten and Pears sailed to North America, going first to Canada and then to New York. They had several reasons for leaving England, including the diffi- W H Auden in 1939 cult position of pacifists in an increasingly bellicose Eu- rope; the success that Frank Bridge had enjoyed in the US; the departure of Auden and his friend Christopher of regular contributors, another of whom was W H Au- Isherwood to the US from England three months pre- den. Together they worked on the documentary films [45] viously; hostile or belittling reviews of Britten’s mu- Coal Face and Night Mail in 1935. They also collab- sic in the English press; and under-rehearsed and inad- orated on the song cycle Our Hunting Fathers (1936), equate performances.[28][57] Britten and Pears consum- radical both in politics and musical treatment, and sub- mated their relationship and from then until Britten’s sequently other works including Cabaret Songs, On This [46] death they were partners in both their professional and Island, Paul Bunyan and Hymn to St. Cecilia. Auden personal lives.[58] When the Second World War began, was a considerable influence on Britten, encouraging him Britten and Pears turned for advice to the British embassy to widen his aesthetic, intellectual and political horizons, in Washington and were told that they should remain in and also to come to terms with his homosexuality. Auden the US as artistic ambassadors.[56] Pears was inclined to was, as David Matthews puts it, “cheerfully and guiltlessly disregard the advice and go back to England; Britten also promiscuous"; Britten, puritanical and conventional by [47] felt the urge to return, but accepted the embassy’s counsel nature, was sexually repressed. and persuaded Pears to do the same.[59] Britten composed prolifically in this period. In the three Already a friend of the composer Aaron Copland, Britten years from 1935 to 1937 he wrote nearly 40 scores for [48] encountered his latest works Billy the Kid and An Outdoor the theatre, cinema and radio. Among the film music Overture, both of which influenced his own music.[60] In of the late 1930s Matthews singles out Night Mail and 1940 Britten composed Seven Sonnets of Michelangelo, Love from a Stranger (1937); among the theatre music the first of many song cycles for Pears.[61] Britten’s or- he selects for mention, The Ascent of F6 (1936), On the chestral works from this period include the Violin Con- Frontier (1938) and Johnson Over Jordan (1939); and of certo and Sinfonia da Requiem. In 1941 Britten pro- the music for radio, King Arthur (1937) and The Sword [49] duced his first music drama, Paul Bunyan, an operetta, in the Stone (1939). to a libretto by Auden.[57] While in the US, Britten had In 1937 there were two events of huge importance in Brit- his first encounter with Balinese gamelan music, through ten’s life: his mother died, and he met the tenor Peter transcriptions for piano duo made by the Canadian com- 1.5 Return to England 5

poser Colin McPhee. The two met in the summer of 1939 and subsequently performed a number of McPhee’s tran- scriptions for a recording.[62] This musical encounter bore fruit in several Balinese-inspired works later in Britten’s career.[63] Moving to the US did not relieve Britten of the nuisance of hostile criticism: although Olin Downes, the doyen of New York music critics, and Irving Kolodin took to Brit- ten’s music, Virgil Thomson was, as the music scholar Suzanne Robinson puts it, consistently “severe and spite- ful”. Thomson described Les Illuminations (1940) as “lit- tle more than a series of bromidic and facile 'effects’ ... pretentious, banal and utterly disappointing”, and was equally unflattering about Pears’s voice. Robinson sur- mises that Thomson was motivated by “a mixture of spite, national pride, and professional jealousy”.[56] Paul Bun- yan met with wholesale critical disapproval,[64] and the Sinfonia da Requiem (already rejected by its Japanese sponsors because of its overtly Christian nature) received a mixed reception when Barbirolli and the New York Philharmonic premiered it in March 1941. The reputa- tion of the work was much enhanced when Koussevitzky took it up shortly afterwards.[65]

1.5 Return to England

In 1942 Britten read the work of the poet George Crabbe for the first time.[66] The Borough, set on the Suffolk coast close to Britten’s homeland, awakened in him such long- Page from “Peter Grimes” in 1812 edition of Crabbe's The Bor- ings for England that he knew he must return. He also ough knew that he must write an opera based on Crabbe’s poem about the fisherman Peter Grimes.[56] Before Britten left the US, Koussevitzky, always generous in encouraging new talent, offered him a $1,000 commission to write ten’s score, as well as some ill-suppressed homophobic the opera.[56][n 6] Britten and Pears returned to England remarks.[72] Peter Grimes opened in June 1945 and was in April 1942. During the long transatlantic sea crossing hailed by public and critics;[73] its box-office takings Britten completed the choral works A Ceremony of Carols matched or exceeded those for La bohème and Madame and Hymn to St Cecilia. The latter was his last large-scale Butterfly, which were staged during the same season.[74] collaboration with Auden. Britten had grown away from The opera administrator Lord Harewood called it “the him, and Auden became one of the composer’s so-called first genuinely successful British opera, Gilbert and Sulli- “corpses” – former intimates from whom he completely van apart, since Purcell.”[75] Dismayed by the in-fighting cut off contact once they had outlived their usefulness to among the company, Cross, Britten and Pears severed him or offended him in some way.[69] their ties with Sadler’s Wells in December 1945, go- ing on to found what was to become the English Opera Having arrived in Britain, Britten and Pears applied for [76] recognition as conscientious objectors; Britten was ini- Group. tially allowed only non-combatant service in the military, A month after the opening of Peter Grimes, Britten and but on appeal he gained unconditional exemption.[70] Af- Yehudi Menuhin went to Germany to give recitals to con- ter the death of his mother in 1937 he had used money centration camp survivors.[77] What they saw, at Belsen she bequeathed him to buy the Old Mill in Snape, Suf- most of all, so shocked Britten that he refused to talk folk which became his country home. He spent much of about it until towards the end of his life, when he told his time there in 1944 working on the opera Peter Grimes. Pears that it had coloured everything he had written Pears joined Sadler’s Wells Opera Company, whose artis- since.[78] Colin Matthews comments that the next two tic director, the singer Joan Cross, announced her inten- works Britten composed after his return, the song-cycle tion to re-open the company’s home base in London with The Holy Sonnets of John Donne and the Second String Britten’s opera, casting herself and Pears in the leading Quartet, contrast strongly with earlier, lighter-hearted roles.[n 7] There were complaints from company members works such as Les Illuminations.[79] Britten recovered his about supposed favouritism and the “cacophony” of Brit- joie de vivre for The Young Person’s Guide to the Orches- 6 1 LIFE AND CAREER

tra (1945), written for an educational film, Instruments of the Orchestra, directed by Muir Mathieson and fea- turing the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Malcolm Sargent.[80] It became, and remained, his most often played and popular work.[81] Britten’s next opera, The Rape of Lucretia, was presented at the first post-war Glyndebourne Festival in 1946. It was then taken on tour to provincial cities under the ban- ner of the “Glyndebourne English Opera Company”, an uneasy alliance of Britten and his associates with John Christie, the autocratic proprietor of Glyndebourne.[82] The tour lost money heavily, and Christie announced that he would underwrite no more tours.[83] Britten and his associates set up the English Opera Group; the librettist Eric Crozier and the designer John Piper joined Britten as artistic directors. The group’s express purpose was to produce and commission new English operas and other works, presenting them throughout the country.[84] Brit- ten wrote the comic opera Albert Herring for the group in 1947; while on tour in the new work Pears came up with the idea of mounting a festival in the small Suffolk sea- side town of Aldeburgh, where Britten had moved from Snape earlier in the year, and which became his principal residence for the rest of his life.[85] John Piper's Benjamin Britten memorial window in the Church of St Peter and St Paul, Aldeburgh. 1.6 Aldeburgh; the 1950s

The Aldeburgh Festival was launched in June 1948, with Britten, Pears and Crozier directing it.[86] Albert Herring such a gala[96] – did not overcome what Matthews calls played at the Jubilee Hall, and Britten’s new cantata for the “ingrained philistinism” of the ruling classes.[97][n 9] tenor, chorus and orchestra, Saint Nicolas, was presented Although Gloriana did well at the box office, there were in the parish church.[87] The festival was an immediate no further productions in Britain for another 13 years.[98] success and became an annual event that has continued It was later recognised as one of Britten’s finer operas.[99] into the 21st century.[88] New works by Britten featured The Turn of the Screw the following year was an unqual- in almost every festival until his death in 1976, including ified success;[100] together with Peter Grimes it became, the premieres of his operas A Midsummer Night’s Dream and at 2013 remained, one of the two most frequently at the Jubilee Hall in 1960 and Death in Venice at Snape performed of Britten’s operas.[101] Maltings Concert Hall in 1973.[89] In the 1950s the “fervently anti-homosexual” Home Unlike many leading English composers, Britten was not Secretary, David Maxwell Fyfe,[102] urged the police known as a teacher,[n 8] but in 1949 he accepted his only to enforce the Victorian laws making homosexual acts private pupil, Arthur Oldham, who studied with him for illegal.[103][n 10] Britten and Pears came under scrutiny; three years. Oldham made himself useful, acting as mu- Britten was visited by police officers in 1953 and was sical assistant and arranging Variations on a Theme by so perturbed that he discussed with his assistant Imogen Frank Bridge for full orchestra for the Frederick Ashton Holst the possibility that Pears might have to enter a sham ballet Le Rêve de Léonor (1949),[93] but he later described marriage (with whom is unclear). In the end nothing was the teacher–pupil relationship as “beneficial five per cent done.[104] [94] to [Britten] and ninety-five per cent to me!" An increasingly important influence on Britten was the Throughout the 1950s Britten continued to write operas. music of the East, an interest that was fostered by a tour Billy Budd (1951) was well received at its Covent Garden there with Pears in 1956, when Britten once again en- premiere and was regarded by reviewers as an advance countered the music of the Balinese gamelan[105] and saw on Peter Grimes.[95] Gloriana (1953), written to mark the for the first time Japanese Noh plays, which he called coronation of Elizabeth II, had a cool reception at the gala “some of the most wonderful drama I have ever seen.”[106] premiere in the presence of the Queen and the British These eastern influences were seen and heard in the ballet Establishment en masse. The downbeat story of Elizabeth The Prince of the Pagodas (1957) and later in two of the I in her decline, and Britten’s score – reportedly thought three semi-operatic “Parables for Church Performance": by members of the premiere’s audience “too modern” for Curlew River (1964) and The Prodigal Son (1968).[107] 1.8 Last years 7

1.7 1960s quiem, was premiered in 1962. He had been asked four years earlier to write a work for the consecration of the By the 1960s, the Aldeburgh Festival was outgrowing its new Coventry Cathedral, a modernist building designed customary venues, and plans to build a new concert hall in by Basil Spence. The old cathedral had been left in Aldeburgh were not progressing. When redundant Victo- ruins by an air-raid on the city in 1940 in which hun- rian maltings buildings in the village of Snape, six miles dreds of people died.[114] Britten decided that his work inland, became available for hire, Britten realised that the would commemorate the dead of both World Wars in largest of them could be converted into a concert hall a large-scale score for soloists, chorus, chamber ensem- and opera house. The 830-seat Snape Maltings hall was ble and orchestra. His text interspersed the traditional opened by the Queen at the start of the twentieth Alde- Requiem Mass with poems by Wilfred Owen. Matthews burgh Festival on 2 June 1967; it was immediately hailed writes, “With the War Requiem Britten reached the apex as one of the best concert halls in the country.[108] The of his reputation: it was almost universally hailed as hall was destroyed by fire in 1969, but Britten was deter- a masterpiece.”[115] Shostakovich told Rostropovich that mined that it would be rebuilt in time for the following he believed it to be “the greatest work of the twentieth year’s festival, which it was. The Queen again attended century”.[116] [109] the opening performance in 1970. In 1967 the BBC commissioned Britten to write an opera specially for television. Owen Wingrave was based, like The Turn of the Screw, on a ghost story by Henry James.[57] By the 1960s Britten found composition much slower than in his prolific youth; he told the 28-year-old composer Nicholas Maw, “Get as much done now as you can, because it gets much, much more difficult as you grow older.”[117] He did not complete the score of the new opera until August 1970.[57] Owen Wingrave was first broadcast in Britain in May 1971, when it was also tele- vised in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, the USA and Yugoslavia.[118]

1.8 Last years

In September 1970 Britten asked Myfanwy Piper, who had adapted the two Henry James stories for him, to turn another prose story into a libretto. This was Thomas Mann's novella Death in Venice, a subject he had been considering for some time.[119] At an early stage in com- position Britten was told by his doctors that a heart op- eration was essential if he was to live for more than two years. He was determined to finish the opera and worked urgently to complete it before going into hospital for surgery.[120] His long-term colleague Colin Graham wrote: Mstislav Rostropovich and Britten, 1964 Perhaps of all his works, this one went The Maltings gave the festival a venue that could deepest into Britten’s own soul: there are ex- comfortably house large orchestral works and operas. traordinary cross-currents of affinity between Britten conducted the first performance outside Rus- himself, his own state of health and mind, sia of Shostakovich’s Fourteenth Symphony at Snape in Thomas Mann, Aschenbach (Mann’s dying [110] 1970. Shostakovich, a friend since 1960, dedicated protagonist), and Peter Pears, who must have [111] the symphony to Britten; he was himself the dedica- had to tear himself in three in order to recon- [112] tee of The Prodigal Son. Two other Russian musicians stitute himself as the principal character.[120] who were close to Britten and regularly performed at the festival were the pianist Sviatoslav Richter and the cellist After the completion of the opera Britten went into the Mstislav Rostropovich. Britten composed his cello suites, National Heart Hospital and was operated on in May 1973 Cello Symphony and Cello Sonata for Rostropovich, who [113] to replace a failing heart valve. The replacement was suc- premiered them at the Aldeburgh Festival. cessful, but he suffered a slight stroke, affecting his right One of the best known of Britten’s works, the War Re- hand. This brought his career as a performer to an end.[57] 8 2 PERSONAL LIFE AND CHARACTER

While in hospital Britten became friendly with a senior to God.[135] Politically, Britten was on the left. He told nursing sister, Rita Thomson; she moved to Aldeburgh in Pears that he always voted either Liberal or Labour and 1974 and looked after him until his death.[121] could not imagine ever voting Conservative, but he was never a member of any party, except the Peace Pledge Britten’s last works include the Suite on English Folk [136] Tunes “A Time There Was” (1974); the Third String Union. Quartet (1975), which drew on material from Death in Physically, Britten was never robust. He walked and Venice; and the dramatic cantata Phaedra (1975), written swam regularly and kept himself as fit as he could, but for Janet Baker.[122] Carpenter in his 1992 biography mentions 20 illnesses, In July 1976, the last year of his life, Britten accepted a few of them minor but most fairly serious, suffered over the years by Britten before his final heart complaint a life peerage – the first composer so honoured – be- [137] coming Baron Britten of Aldeburgh in the County of developed. Emotionally, according to some commen- [123][n 11] tators, Britten never completely grew up, retaining in his Suffolk. After the 1976 Aldeburgh Festival, Brit- [57][138] ten and Pears travelled to Norway, where Britten began outlook something of a child’s view of the world. writing Praise We Great Men, for voices and orchestra He was not always confident that he was the genius others based on a poem by Edith Sitwell.[126] He returned to declared him to be, and though he was hypercritical of his own works, he was acutely, even aggressively sensitive to Aldeburgh in August, and wrote Welcome Ode for chil- [139] dren’s choir and orchestra.[127] In November, Britten re- criticism from anybody else. alised that he could no longer compose.[128] On his 63rd Britten was, as he acknowledged, notorious for dump- birthday, 22 November, at his request Rita Thomson or- ing friends and colleagues who either offended him or ganised a champagne party and invited his friends and his ceased to be of use – his “corpses”.[140] The conductor Sir sisters Barbara and Beth, to say their goodbyes to the dy- Charles Mackerras believed that the term was invented by ing composer.[129] When Rostropovich made his farewell Lord Harewood. Both Mackerras and Harewood joined visit a few days later, Britten gave him what he had writ- the list of corpses, the former for joking that the num- ten of Praise We Great Men.[129] ber of boys in Noye’s Fludde must have been a delight I heard of his death ... and took a long walk in total silence to the composer, and the latter for an extramarital af- fair and subsequent divorce from Lady Harewood, which through gently falling snow across a frozen lake, which [141] corresponded exactly to the inexpressible sense of numb- shocked the puritanical Britten. Among other corpses were his librettists Montagu Slater and Eric Crozier. The ness at such a loss. The world is colder and lonelier with- out the presence of our supreme creator of music. latter said in 1949, “He has sometimes told me, jokingly, that one day I would join the ranks of his 'corpses’ and “ I have always recognized that any ordinary person must ” soon outlive his usefulness to such a great creative artist as Ben.”[140] Dame Janet Baker said in 1981, “I think he was Peter Maxwell Davies, 1977[117] quite entitled to take what he wanted from others ... He did not want to hurt anyone, but the task in hand was more important than anything or anybody.”[142] Matthews feels Britten died of congestive heart failure on 4 Decem- that this aspect of Britten has been exaggerated, and he ber 1976. His funeral service was held at Aldeburgh observes that the composer sustained many deep friend- [129] Parish Church three days later, and he was buried ships to the end of his life.[143] in its churchyard, with a gravestone carved by Reynolds Stone.[130] The authorities at Westminster Abbey had of- fered burial there, but Britten had made it clear that he wished his grave to be side by side with that, in due 2.1 Controversies course, of Pears.[131] A memorial service was held at the Abbey on 10 March 1977, at which the congregation was Boys headed by Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother.[132] Throughout his adult life, Britten had a particular rapport with children and enjoyed close friendships with several boys, particularly those in their early teens.[n 12] The first such friendship was with Piers Dunkerley, 13 years old in 2 Personal life and character 1934 when Britten was aged 20.[146] Other boys Britten befriended were the young David Hemmings and Michael Despite his large number of works on Christian themes, Crawford, both of whom sang treble roles in his works in Britten has sometimes been thought of as agnostic.[133] the 1950s.[147] Hemmings later said, “In all of the time Pears said that when they met in 1937 he was not sure that I spent with him he never abused that trust”, and whether or not Britten would have described himself as Crawford wrote “I cannot say enough about the kindness a Christian.[134] In the 1960s Britten called himself a of that great man ... he had a wonderful patience and dedicated Christian, though sympathetic to the radical affinity with young people. He loved music, and loved views propounded by the Bishop of Woolwich in Honest youngsters caring about music.”[28] 9

It was long suspected by several of Britten’s close asso- 3 Music ciates that there was something exceptional about his at- traction to teenage boys: Auden referred to Britten’s “at- See also: List of compositions by Benjamin Britten traction to thin-as-a-board juveniles ... to the sexless and innocent”,[148] and Pears once wrote to Britten: “remem- ber there are lovely things in the world still – children, boys, sunshine, the sea, Mozart, you and me”.[149] In pub- lic, the matter was little discussed during Britten’s life- 3.1 Influences time and much discussed after it.[n 13] Carpenter’s 1992 biography closely examined the evidence, as do later stud- Britten’s early musical life was dominated by the classi- ies of Britten, most particularly John Bridcut's Britten’s cal masters; his mother’s ambition was for him to become [158] Children (2006), which concentrates on Britten’s friend- the "Fourth B" – after Bach, Beethoven and Brahms. ships and relationships with various children and adoles- Britten was later to assert that his initial development as cents. Some commentators have continued to question a composer was stifled by reverence for these masters: Britten’s conduct, sometimes very sharply.[151] Carpen- “Between the ages of thirteen and sixteen I knew every ter and Bridcut conclude that he held any sexual impulses note of Beethoven and Brahms. I remember receiving under firm control and kept the relationships affectionate the full score of Fidelio for my fourteenth birthday ... but strictly platonic.[152] But I think in a sense I never forgave them for having led me astray in my own particular thinking and natural inclinations”.[159] He developed a particular animosity to- wards Brahms, whose piano music he had once held in great esteem; in 1952 he confided that he played through all Brahms’s music from time to time, “to see if I am right about him; I usually find that I underestimated last time how bad it was!"[57] Through his association with Frank Bridge, Britten’s mu- sical horizons expanded.[25] He discovered the music of Debussy and Ravel which, Matthews writes, “gave him a model for an orchestral sound”.[160] Bridge also led Brit- ten to the music of Schoenberg and Berg; the latter’s death in 1935 affected Britten deeply. A letter at that time reveals his thoughts on the contemporary music scene: “The real musicians are so few & far between, aren't they? Apart from the Bergs, Stravinskys, Schoenbergs & Bridges one is a bit stumped for names, isn't one?" – Britten’s grave in St. Peter and St Paul’s Church, Aldeburgh, Suf- adding, as an afterthought: “Shostakovitch – perhaps – folk possibly”.[57] By this time Britten had developed a lasting hostility towards the English pastoral school represented by Vaughan Williams and Ireland, whose work he com- Cause of death pared unfavourably with the “brilliant folk-song arrange- ments of Percy Grainger"; Grainger became the inspira- A more recent controversy was the statement in a 2013 [161][162] biography of Britten by Paul Kildea that the composer’s tion of many of Britten’s later folk arrangements. Britten was also impressed by Delius, and thought Brigg heart failure was due to undetected syphilis, which Kildea [163] speculates was a result of Pears’s promiscuity while the Fair “delicious” when he heard it in 1931. Also in that two were living in New York.[153] In response, Britten’s year he heard Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring, which he consultant cardiologist said that, like all the hospital’s found “bewildering and terrifying”, yet at the same time similar cases, Britten was routinely screened for syphilis “incredibly marvellous and arresting”. The same com- [154] poser’s Symphony of Psalms, and Petrushka were lauded before the operation, with negative results. He de- [57] scribed as “complete rubbish” Kildea’s allegation that the in similar terms. However, he and Stravinsky later developed a mutual antipathy informed by jealousy and surgeon who operated on Britten in 1973 would or even [164] could have covered up a syphilitic condition.[155] Kildea mistrust. continued to maintain, “When all the composer’s symp- Besides his growing attachments to the works of 20th toms are considered there can be only one cause”.[156] In century masters, Britten – along with his contemporary The Times, Richard Morrison praised the rest of Kildea’s Michael Tippett – was devoted to the English music of book, and hoped that its reputation would not be “tar- the late 17th and early 18th centuries, in particular the nished by one sensational speculation ... some second- work of Purcell.[165] In defining his mission as a com- hand hearsay ... presenting unsubstantiated gossip as poser of opera, Britten wrote: “One of my chief aims is fact”.[157] to try to restore to the musical setting of the English Lan- 10 3 MUSIC

guage a brilliance, freedom and vitality that have been written for full-strength opera companies, to chamber op- curiously rare since the death of Purcell”.[166] Among eras for performance by small touring opera ensembles or the closest of Britten’s kindred composer spirits – even in churches and schools. In the large-scale category are more so than Purcell – was Mahler, whose Fourth Sym- Peter Grimes (1945), Billy Budd (1951), Gloriana (1953), phony Britten heard in September 1930. At that time A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1960) and Death in Venice Mahler’s music was little regarded and rarely played in (1973). Of the remaining operas, The Rape of Lucretia English concert halls.[167] Britten later wrote of how the (1946), Albert Herring (1947), The Little Sweep (1949) scoring of this work impressed him: "... entirely clean and The Turn of the Screw (1954) were written for small and transparent ... the material was remarkable, and the opera companies. Noye’s Fludde (1958), Curlew River melodic shapes highly original, with such rhythmic and (1964), The Burning Fiery Furnace (1966) and The Prodi- harmonic tension from beginning to end”.[39] He soon gal Son (1968) were for church performance, and the sec- discovered other Mahler works, in particular Das Lied ular The Golden Vanity was intended to be performed in von der Erde; he wrote to a friend about the concluding schools. Owen Wingrave, written for television, was first “Abschied” of Das Lied: “It is cruel, you know, that mu- presented live by the Royal Opera at Covent Garden in sic should be so beautiful”.[168][n 14] Apart from Mahler’s 1973, two years after its broadcast premiere.[57] general influence on Britten’s compositional style, the in- Music critics have frequently commented on the recurring corporation by Britten of popular tunes (as, for example, theme in Britten’s operas from Peter Grimes onward of in Death in Venice) is a direct inheritance from the older [175] [170] the isolated individual at odds with a hostile society. composer. The extent to which this reflected Britten’s perception of himself, pacifist and homosexual, in the England of the 1930s, 40s and 50s is debated.[176] Another recurrent 3.2 Operas theme is the corruption of innocence, most sharply seen in The Turn of the Screw.[177] The Britten-Pears Foundation considers the composer’s operas “perhaps the most substantial and important part Over the 28 years between Peter Grimes and Death in of his compositional legacy.”[171] Britten’s operas are Venice Britten’s musical style changed, as he introduced firmly established in the international repertoire: ac- elements of atonalism – though remaining essentially cording to Operabase, they are performed worldwide a tonal composer – and of eastern music, particularly [57] more than those of any other composer born in the 20th gamelan sounds but also eastern harmonies. In A Mid- century,[172] and only Puccini and Richard Strauss come summer Night’s Dream the orchestral scoring varies to fit ahead of him if the list is extended to all operas composed the nature of each set of characters: “the bright, percus- after 1900.[173] sive sounds of harps, keyboards and percussion for the fairy world, warm strings and wind for the pairs of lovers, The early operetta Paul Bunyan stands apart from Brit- and lower woodwind and brass for the mechanicals”.[178] ten’s later operatic works. Philip Brett, in Grove's article In Death in Venice Britten turns Tadzio and his fam- on Britten, calls it “a patronizing attempt by W H Auden ily into silent dancers, “accompanied by the colourful, to evoke the spirit of a nation not his own in which Brit- glittering sounds of tuned percussion to emphasize their [57] ten was a somewhat dazzled accomplice”. The Amer- remoteness.”[179] ican public liked it, but the critics did not,[n 15] and it fell into neglect until interest revived near the end of the com- As early as 1948 the music analyst Hans Keller, sum- poser’s life.[57] marising Britten’s impact on 20th-century opera to that date, compared his contribution to that of Mozart in the 18th century: “Mozart may in some respects be regarded as a founder (a 'second founder') of opera. The same can already be said today, as far as the modern British – per- haps not only British – field goes, of Britten”.[180] In ad- dition to his own original operas, Britten, together with Imogen Holst, extensively revised Purcell’s Dido and Ae- neas (1951) and The Fairy-Queen (1967). These “real- isations” brought Purcell, who was then neglected, to a wider public, but have themselves been neglected since the dominance of the trend to authentic performance practice.[181] His 1948 revision of The Beggar’s Opera amounts to a wholesale recomposition, retaining the orig- inal melodies but giving them new, highly sophisticated orchestral accompaniments.[182] Peter Pears as the General in Owen Wingrave, 1971

Britten’s subsequent operas range from large-scale works 3.4 Other vocal works 11

3.3 Song cycles matic connection with any of the others.[183] The Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings (1943) sets Throughout his career Britten was drawn to the song cy- verses by a variety of poets, all on the theme of night- cle form. In 1928, when he was 14, he composed an or- time. Though Britten described the cycle as “not impor- chestral cycle, Quatre chansons françaises, setting words tant stuff, but quite pleasant, I think”, it was immediately by Victor Hugo and Paul Verlaine. Brett comments that greeted as a masterpiece, and together with Peter Grimes though the work is much influenced by Wagner on the one it established him as one of the leading composers of his hand and French mannerisms on the other, “the diatonic day.[28] Mason calls it “a beautifully unified work on ut- nursery-like tune for the sad boy with the consumptive [57] terly dissimilar poems, held together by the most superfi- mother in 'L'enfance' is entirely characteristic”. After cial but most effective, and therefore most suitable sym- he came under Auden’s influence Britten composed Our phonic method. Some of the music is pure word-painting, Hunting Fathers (1936), ostensibly a protest against fox- some of it mood-painting, of the subtlest kind.”[185] Two hunting but which also alludes allegorically to the con- years later, after witnessing the horrors of Belsen, Britten temporary political state of Europe. The work has never composed The Holy Sonnets of John Donne, a work whose been popular; in 1948 the critic Colin Mason lamented bleakness was not matched until his final tenor and piano its neglect and called it one of Britten’s greatest works. In cycle a quarter of a century later. Britten’s technique in Mason’s view the cycle is “as exciting as Les Illuminations, this cycle ranges from atonality in the first song to firm and offers many interesting and enjoyable foretastes of [183] tonality later, with a resolute B major chord at the climax the best moments of his later works.” of “Death, be not proud”.[77] Nocturne (1958) is the last of the orchestral cycles. As in the Serenade, Britten set words by a range of po- ets, who here include Shakespeare, Coleridge, Keats, Shelley, Tennyson and Wilfred Owen.[57] The whole cy- cle is darker in tone than the Serenade, with pre-echoes of the War Requiem.[186] All the songs have subtly dif- ferent orchestrations, with a prominent obbligato part for a different instrument in each.[186] Among Britten’s later song cycles with piano accompaniment is the Songs and Proverbs of William Blake, composed for the baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau. This presents all its poems in a continuous stream of music; Brett writes that it “inter- leaves a ritornello-like setting of the seven proverbs with seven songs that paint an increasingly sombre picture of human existence.”[57] A Pushkin cycle, The Poet’s Echo (1965), was written for Galina Vishnevskaya, and shows a more robust and extrovert side of the composer.[57] Though written ostensibly in the tradition of European song cycles, it draws atmospherically on the polyphony Poets whose words Britten set included (clockwise from top l) of south-east Asian music.[28] Who Are These Children? Blake, Rimbaud, Owen and Verlaine (1969), setting 12 verses by William Soutar, is among the grimmest of Britten’s cycles. After he could no longer The first of Britten’s song cycles to gain widespread pop- play the piano, Britten composed a cycle of Robert Burns ularity was Les Illuminations (1940), for high voice (orig- settings, A Birthday Hansel (1976), for voice and harp.[57] inally soprano, later more often sung by tenors)[n 16] with string orchestra accompaniment, setting words by Arthur Rimbaud. Britten’s music reflects the eroticism in Rim- 3.4 Other vocal works baud’s poems; Copland commented of the section “An- tique” that he did not know how Britten dared to write the Nicholas Maw said of Britten’s vocal music: “His feeling melody.[57] Matthews judges the piece the crowning mas- for poetry (not only English) and the inflexions of lan- terpiece of Britten’s early years.[184] By the time of Brit- guage make him, I think, the greatest musical realizer ten’s next cycle, Seven Sonnets of Michelangelo (1942) for of English”.[117] One of the best-known works in which tenor and piano, Pears had become his partner and muse; Britten set poetry was the War Requiem (1962). It in- in Matthews’s phrase, Britten wrote the cycle as “his dec- tersperses the Latin requiem mass, sung by soprano and laration of love for Peter”.[184] It too finds the sensuality chorus, with settings of works by the First World War of the verses it sets, though in its structure it resembles poet Wilfred Owen, sung by tenor and baritone. At the a conventional 19th-century song cycle. Mason draws a end the two elements are combined, as the last line of distinction between this and Britten’s earlier cycles, be- Owen’s “Strange meeting” mingles with the In paradisum cause here each song is self-contained, and has no the- of the mass. Matthews describes the conclusion of the 12 3 MUSIC

work as “a great wave of benediction [which] recalls the ations, an affectionate tribute to Britten’s teacher, range end of the Sinfonia da Requiem, and its similar ebbing from comic parodies of Italian operatic clichés and Vi- away into the sea that symbolises both reconciliation and ennese waltzes to a strutting march, reflecting the rise death.”[187] Other works for voices and orchestra include of militarism in Europe, and a Mahlerian funeral march; the Missa Brevis and the Cantata academica (both 1959) the piece ends with an exuberant fugal finale.[199] The on religious themes, and the late cantata Phaedra (1975), Sinfonia moves from an opening Lacrymosa filled with a story of fated love and death modelled on Handel's Ital- fear and lamentation to a fierce Dies Irae and then to ian cantatas.[188] a final Requiem aeternam, described by the critic Her- bert Glass as “the most uneasy 'eternal rest' possible”.[200] Smaller-scale works for accompanied voice include the five Canticles, composed between 1947 and 1974. They Mason considers the Sinfonia a failure: “less entertain- ing than usual, because its object is not principally to are written for a variety of voices (tenor in all five; counter-tenor or alto in II and IV and baritone in IV) entertain but to express symphonically. It fails because it is neither picturesquely nor formally symphonic”.[183] and accompaniments (piano in I to IV, horn in III and harp in V).[189] The first is a setting of Francis Quar- The Sea Interludes, adapted by Britten from the full score Peter Grimes les's 17th century poem “A Divine Rapture”,[190] and of , make a concert suite depicting the sea according to Britten was modelled on Purcell’s Divine and the Borough in which the opera is set; the charac- Hymns.[191] Matthews describes it as one of the com- ter of the music is strongly contrasted between “Dawn”, poser’s most serene works, which “ends in a mood of “Sunday Morning”, “Moonlight” and “Storm”. The com- untroubled happiness that would soon become rare in mentator Howard Posner observes that there is not a bar [190] in the interludes, no matter how beautiful, that is free Britten’s music”. The second Canticle was written in [201] 1952, between Billy Budd and Gloriana, on the theme of foreboding. The Young Person’s Guide, based on of Abraham's obedience to Divine Authority in the prof- a theme by Purcell, showcases the orchestra’s individ- [192] [n 17] ual sections and groups, and gained widespread popular- fered sacrifice of his son Isaac. “Canticle III” [202][203] from 1954 is a setting of Edith Sitwell’s wartime poem ity from the outset. Christopher Headington calls “Still Falls the Rain”, composed just after The Turn of the work “exuberant and uncomplicated music, scored the Screw with which it is structurally and stylistically with clarity and vigour [that] fits well into Britten’s oeu- vre.”[202] David Matthews calls it “a brilliant educational associated. The twelve-note cycle in the first five bars [203][n 18] of the piano part of the Canticle introduced a feature exercise.” that became thereafter a regular part of Britten’s com- Unlike his English predecessors such as Elgar and positional technique.[194] The fourth Canticle, premiered Vaughan Williams, and composers from mainland in 1971 is based on T. S. Eliot's poem “Journey of the Europe whom he admired, including Mahler and Magi”. It is musically close to The Burning Fiery Furnace Shostakovich, Britten was not a classical symphonist. His of 1966; Matthews refers to it as a “companion piece” youthful jeux d'esprit the Simple Symphony (1934) is in to the earlier work.[195] The final Canticle was another conventional symphonic structure, observing sonata form Eliot setting, his juvenile poem “Death of Saint Narcis- and the traditional four-movement pattern, but of his ma- sus”. Although Britten had little idea of what the poem ture works his Spring Symphony (1949) is more a song was about,[196] the musicologist Arnold Whittall finds the cycle than a true symphony,[57] and the concertante Cello text “almost frighteningly apt ... for a composer conscious Symphony (1963) is an attempt to balance the traditional of his own sickness”.[197] Matthews sees Narcissus as “an- concerto and symphony. During its four movements the other figure from [Britten’s] magic world of dreams and Cello Symphony moves from a deeply pessimistic open- ideal beauty”.[198] ing to a finale of radiant happiness rare for Britten by this point.[205] The composer considered it “the finest thing I've written”.[206] 3.5 Orchestral works The Piano Concerto (1938) was at first criticised for be- ing too light-hearted and virtuoso. In 1945 Britten re- The Britten scholar Donald Mitchell has written, “It is vised it, replacing a skittish third movement with a more easy, because of the scope, stature, and sheer volume of sombre passacaglia that, in Matthews’s view, gives the the operas, and the wealth of vocal music of all kinds, work more depth, and makes the apparent triumph of the to pay insufficient attention to the many works Britten finale more ambivalent.[207] The Violin Concerto (1940) [28] wrote in other, specifically non-vocal genres.” Maw has virtuoso elements, but they are balanced by lyrical and said of Britten, “He is one of the 20th century’s great or- elegiac passages, “undoubtedly reflecting Britten’s grow- chestral composers ... His orchestration has an individu- ing concern with the escalation of world hostilities.”[208] ality, incisiveness and integration with the musical mate- Neither concerto is among Britten’s most popular works, [117] rial only achieved by the greatest composers.” Among but in the 21st century the Violin Concerto has been per- Britten’s best-known orchestral works are the Variations formed more frequently than before, both in the concert on a Theme of Frank Bridge (1937), the Sinfonia da Re- hall and on record.[208] quiem (1940), the Four Sea Interludes (1945) and The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra (1945). The Vari- Britten’s incidental music for theatre, film and radio, 3.7 Legacy 13

much of it unpublished, was the subject of an essay by William Mann, published in 1952 in the first detailed critical assessment of Britten’s music to that date.[209] Of these pieces the music for a radio play, The Rescue, by Edward Sackville-West, is praised by the musicologist Lewis Foreman as “of such stature and individual char- acter as to be worth a regular place alongside [Britten’s] other dramatic scores.”[210] Mann finds in this score pre- echoes of the second act of Billy Budd,[211] while Fore- man observes that Britten “appears to have made pass- ing allusions to The Rescue in his final opera, Death in Venice.[210]

3.6 Chamber and instrumental works Snape Maltings concert hall, a main venue of the Aldeburgh Fes- tival, founded by Britten, Pears and Crozier Britten’s close friendship with Rostropovich inspired the Cello Sonata (1961) and three suites for solo cello (1964– 71).[212] String quartets featured throughout Britten’s composing career, from a student work in 1928 to his composer’s career, made a similar point: “There was a Third String Quartet (1975). The second Quartet, from great, huge abyss in his soul ... He got into the valley of 1945, was written in homage to Purcell; Mason consid- the shadow of death and couldn't get out”.[221] ered it Britten’s most important instrumental work to that In the decade after Britten’s death, his standing as a [185] date. Referring to this work, Keller writes of the ease composer in Britain was to some extent overshadowed with which Britten, relatively early in his compositional by that of the still-living Tippett.[222] The film-maker career, solves “the modern sonata problem – the achieve- Tony Palmer, director of a 1979 TV documentary about ment of symmetry and unity within an extended ternary Britten,[223] thought that Tippett’s temporary ascendancy circle based on more than one subject”. Keller likens the might have been a question of the two composers’ con- innovatory skill of the Quartet to that of Walton's Viola trasting personalities: Tippett had more warmth and had [213] Concerto. The third Quartet was Britten’s last major made fewer enemies. In any event this was a short- work; the critic Colin Anderson said of it in 2007, “one lived phenomenon; Tippett adherents such as the com- of Britten’s greatest achievements, one with interesting poser Robert Saxton soon rediscovered their enthusiasm allusions to Bartók and Shostakovich, and written with for Britten, whose audience steadily increased during the an economy that opens out a depth of emotion that can final years of the 20th century.[221] Britten has had few [214] be quite chilling.” The Gemini Variations (1965), for imitators; Brett describes him as “inimitable, possessed flute, violin and piano duet, were based on a theme of of ... a voice and sound too dangerous to imitate”.[57] Zoltán Kodály and written as a virtuoso piece for the 13- Nevertheless, after his death Britten was lauded by the year-old Jeney twins, musical prodigies whom Britten had younger generation of English composers to whom, in [215] met in Budapest in the previous year. For Osian El- the words of Oliver Knussen, he became “a phenome- lis, Britten wrote the Suite for Harp (1969), which Joan nal father-figure”.[221] Brett believes that he affected ev- Chissell in The Times described as “a little masterpiece ery subsequent British composer to some extent: “He is a [216] of concentrated fancy”. key figure in the growth of British musical culture in the second half of the 20th century, and his effect on every- 3.7 Legacy thing from opera to the revitalization of music education is hard to overestimate.”[57] Britten’s fellow-composers had divided views about him. Whittall believes that one reason for Britten’s enduring To Tippett he was “simply the most musical person I have popularity is the “progressive conservatism” of his mu- ever met”, with an “incredible” technical mastery;[217] sic. He generally avoided the avant garde, and did not some contemporaries, however, were less effusive. In challenge the conventions in the way that contemporaries Tippett’s view Walton and others were convinced that such as Tippett did.[224] Perhaps, says Brett, “the tide that Britten and Pears were leaders of a homosexual conspir- swept away serialism, atonality and most forms of musical acy in music,[n 19] a belief Tippett dismisses as ridiculous, modernism and brought in neo-Romanticism, minimal- inspired by jealousy at Britten’s postwar successes.[219] ism and other modes of expression involved with tonality Leonard Bernstein considered Britten “a man at odds with carried with it renewed interest in composers who had the world”, and said of his music: "[I]f you hear it, not been out of step with the times”.[57] Britten defined his just listen to it superficially, you become aware of some- mission as a composer in very simple terms: composers thing very dark”.[220] The tenor Robert Tear, who was should aim at “pleasing people today as seriously as we closely associated with Britten in the latter part of the can”.[225] 14 6 HONOURS, AWARDS AND COMMEMORATIONS

4 Pianist and conductor the first recording of the Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings, which has frequently been reissued, most recently [229] Britten, though a reluctant conductor and a nervous pi- on CD. anist, was greatly sought after in both capacities.[226] The Britten’s first operatic recording was The Turn of the piano accompanist Gerald Moore wrote in his memoirs Screw, made in January 1955 with the original English about playing at all the main music festivals except for Opera Group forces. In 1957 he conducted The Prince Aldeburgh, because “as the presiding genius there is the of the Pagodas in an early stereo recording, supervised greatest accompanist in the world, my services are not by Culshaw.[229] Decca’s first major commercial success needed”.[227][n 20] Britten’s recital partnership with Pears with Britten came the following year, with Peter Grimes, was his best-known collaboration, but he also accompa- which has, at 2013, never been out of the catalogues since nied Kathleen Ferrier, Rostropovich, Dietrich Fischer- its first release.[229] From 1958 Britten conducted Decca Dieskau, James Bowman and John Shirley-Quirk, among recordings of many of his operas and vocal and orchestral others.[229] Though usually too nervous to play piano so- works, including the Nocturne (1959), the Spring Sym- los, Britten often performed piano duets with Clifford phony (1960) and the War Requiem (1963).[229] The last Curzon or Richter, and chamber music with the Amadeus sold in unexpectedly large numbers for a classical set, and Quartet.[229] The composers whose works, other than his thereafter Decca unstintingly made resources available to own, he most often played were Mozart and Schubert; Culshaw and his successors for Britten recordings.[240] the latter, in Murray Perahia's view, was Britten’s greatest Sets followed of Albert Herring (1964), the Sinfonia idol.[230] As a boy and young man, Britten had intensely da Requiem (1964) Curlew River (1965), A Midsum- admired Brahms, but his admiration waned to nothing, mer Night’s Dream (1966), The Burning Fiery Furnace and Brahms seldom featured in his repertory.[n 21] (1967), Billy Budd (1967) and many of the other ma- [229] Singers and players admired Britten’s conducting, and jor works. In 2013, to mark the anniversary of Brit- ten’s birth, Decca released a set of 65 CDs and one DVD, David Webster rated it highly enough to offer him the [n 25] musical directorship of the Covent Garden Opera in “Benjamin Britten – Complete Works”. Most of the 1952.[n 22] Britten declined; he was not confident of his recordings were from Decca’s back catalogue, but in the ability as a conductor and was reluctant to spend too much interests of comprehensiveness a substantial number of [234] tracks were licensed from 20 other companies including time performing rather than composing. As a conduc- [241] tor, Britten’s repertory included Purcell, Bach, Haydn, EMI, Virgin Classics, Naxos, Warner and NMC. Mozart and Schubert, and occasional less characteris- As a pianist and conductor in other composers’ mu- tic choices including Schumann's Scenes from Goethe’s sic, Britten made many recordings for Decca. Among Faust; Elgar’s The Dream of Gerontius and Introduction his studio collaborations with Pears are sets of Schu- and Allegro; Holst's Egdon Heath and short pieces by bert’s Winterreise and Die schöne Müllerin, Schumann’s Percy Grainger.[229][235] Dichterliebe, and songs by Haydn, Mozart, Bridge, Ire- land, Holst, Tippett and Richard Rodney Bennett.[229] Other soloists whom Britten accompanied on record were Ferrier, Rostropovich and Vishnevskaya. As a conduc- 5 Recordings tor he recorded a wide range of composers, from Pur- cell to Grainger. Among his best-known Decca record- Britten, like Elgar and Walton before him, was signed ings are Purcell’s The Fairy-Queen, Bach’s Brandenburg up by a major British recording company,[n 23] and per- concertos, Cantata 151, Cantata 102 and St John Passion, formed a considerable proportion of his output on disc. Elgar’s The Dream of Gerontius and Mozart’s last two [229] For the Decca Record Company he made some monaural symphonies. records in the 1940s and 1950s, followed, with the en- thusiastic support of the Decca producer John Culshaw, by numerous stereophonic versions of his works.[229] Cul- shaw wrote, “The happiest hours I have spent in any studio 6 Honours, awards and commemo- were with Ben, for the basic reason that it did not seem rations that we were trying to make records or video tapes; we [238][n 24] were just trying to make music.” State honours awarded to Britten included Companion of In May 1943 Britten made his debut in the Decca studios, Honour (Britain) in 1953;[242] Commander of the Royal accompanying Sophie Wyss in five of his arrangements of Order of the Polar Star (Sweden) in 1962; the Order of French folk songs. The following January he and Pears Merit (Britain) in 1965;[243] and a life peerage (Britain) in recorded together, in Britten’s arrangements of British July 1976.[123] He received honorary degrees and fellow- folk songs, and the following day, in duet with Curzon ships from 19 conservatories and universities in Europe he recorded his Introduction and Rondo alla burlesca and America. His awards included the Hanseatic Goethe and Mazurka elegiaca. In May 1944 he conducted the Prize (1961); the Aspen Award, Colorado (1964); the Boyd Neel string orchestra, Dennis Brain and Pears in Royal Philharmonic Society's Gold Medal (1964); the 6.1 Centenary 15

Scallop by Maggi Hambling is a sculpture dedicated to Benjamin Britten on the beach at Aldeburgh. The edge of the shell is pierced with the words “I hear those voices that will not be drowned” from Peter Grimes.

137 Cromwell Road blue plaque Walton composed Improvisations on an Impromptu of Benjamin Britten, based on a theme from Britten’s Pi- ano Concerto.[253] Works commemorating Britten in- Sibelius Prize (1965); the Mahler Medal (Bruckner and clude Cantus in Memoriam Benjamin Britten an orchestral Mahler Society of America, 1967); the Léonie Sonning piece written in 1977 by Arvo Pärt, and Sally Beamish's Music Prize (Denmark, 1968); the Ernst von Siemens [244] Variations on a Theme of Benjamin Britten, based on the Prize (1974); and the Ravel Prize (1974). second Sea Interlude from Peter Grimes; she composed Prizes for individual works included UNESCO's the work to mark Britten’s centenary.[254] Alan Bennett International Rostrum of Composers 1961 (for A depicts Britten in a 2009 play The Habit of Art, set while Midsummer Night’s Dream); and for the War Requiem Britten is composing Death in Venice and centred on a fic- Grammy Awards 1963 – Classical Album of the Year, tional meeting between Britten and Auden. Britten was Best Classical Composition by a Contemporary Com- played in the premiere production by Alex Jennings.[255] poser and Best Classical Performance – Choral (Other than Opera); the BRIT Awards 1977 – Best Orchestral Album of the past 25 years; and the Grammy Hall of 6.1 Centenary Fame Award 1998.[245] In September 2012, to mark the composer’s forthcoming The Red House in Aldeburgh, where Britten and Pears centenary, the Britten-Pears Foundation launched “Brit- lived and worked together from 1957 until Britten’s death ten 100”, a collaboration of leading organisations in the in 1976, is now the home of the Britten-Pears Founda- [246] performing arts, publishing, broadcasting, film, academia tion, established to promote their musical legacy. In and heritage.[256] Among the events were the release of Britten’s centenary year his studio at the Red House was a feature film Benjamin Britten – Peace and Conflict,[257] restored to the way it was in the 1950s and opened to and a centenary exhibition at the British Library.[258] The the public. The converted hayloft was designed and built Royal Mint issued a 50-pence piece, to mark the cente- by H T Cadbury Brown in 1958 and was described by [247] nary – the first time a composer has featured on a British Britten as a “magnificent work”. In June 2013 Dame coin.[259] Janet Baker officially opened the Britten-Pears archive in a new building in the grounds of the Red House.[248] Centenary performances of the War Requiem were given at eighteen locations in Britain. Opera productions in- A memorial stone to Britten was unveiled in the north [249] cluded Owen Wingrave at Aldeburgh, Billy Budd at Glyn- choir aisle of Westminster Abbey in 1978. There are debourne, Death in Venice by English National Opera, memorial plaques to him at three of his London homes: Gloriana by The Royal Opera, and Peter Grimes, Death 173 Cromwell Road, 45a St John’s Wood High Street,[250] [251] in Venice and A Midsummer Night’s Dream by Opera and 8 Halliford Street in Islington. In April 2013 Brit- North.[260] Peter Grimes was performed on the beach ten was honoured by the Royal Mail in the UK, as one at Aldeburgh, opening the 2013 Aldeburgh Festival in of ten people selected as subjects for the “Great Britons” [252] June 2013, with Steuart Bedford conducting and singers commemorative postage stamp issue. from the Chorus of Opera North and the Chorus of the Tony Palmer made three documentary films about Brit- Guildhall School of Music and Drama,[261] described by ten: Benjamin Britten & his Festival (1967), A Time There The Guardian as “a remarkable, and surely unrepeatable Was (1979) and Nocturne (2013).[223] achievement.”[262] Other creative artists have celebrated Britten. In 1970 Internationally, the anniversary was marked by perfor- 16 7 NOTES, REFERENCES AND SOURCES mances of the War Requiem, Peter Grimes and other made homeless by air-raids; the Sadler’s Wells opera com- works in four continents. In the US the centennial events pany toured the British provinces, returning to its home were described as “coast to coast,” with a Britten festi- base in June 1945.[71] val at Carnegie Hall, and performances at the New York [8] Sullivan, Parry, Stanford, Elgar, Vaughan Williams, Philharmonic, the Metropolitan Opera and Los Angeles [263] Holst and Tippett were among the leading British com- Opera. posers of their time who held posts at conservatoires or universities.[90] Those who, like Britten, were not known for teaching included Delius[91] and Walton.[92] 7 Notes, references and sources [9] The critic Andrew Porter wrote at the time: “The audience naturally contained many people distinguished in political Notes and social spheres rather than noted for their appreciation of twentieth-century music, and Gloriana was not well re- [1] Britten’s siblings were (Edith) Barbara (1902–82), Robert ceived at its first hearing. The usual philistine charges Harry Marsh (“Bobby”, 1907–87), and (Charlotte) Eliza- brought against it, as against so much contemporary music beth (“Beth”, 1909–89).[3] ('no tunes – ugly, discordant sounds’, and the rest), are be- neath consideration. On the other hand, those who found [2] Britten later gave an example of the detailed skill instilled Gloriana ill-suited to the occasion may be allowed to have in him by Bridge: “I came up with a series of major sev- some right on their side.”[96] enths on the violin. Bridge was against this, saying that the instrument didn't vibrate properly with this interval: it [10] The principal law against homosexual acts was the [27] should be divided between two instruments”. Criminal Law Amendment Act 1885, in which Section 11 made any kind of sexual activity between men illegal for [3] When it came to leaving Gresham’s, Britten found it a the first time. It was not repealed until the passage of the wrench, confessing: “I am terribly sorry to leave such Sexual Offences Act 1967 boys as these. [...] I didn't think I should be so sorry to leave.”[32] In his later years, Britten helped secure a place [32] [11] Some writers have supposed that Britten was earlier of- at the school for David Hemmings, fered and had declined a knighthood,[124] but his name [4] This academic mistrust of Britten’s technical skills per- is not included in the official list issued in 2012 by the sisted. In 1994 the critic Derrick Puffett wrote that in Cabinet Office naming everyone (except those still living the 1960s Britten was still regarded with suspicion on ac- at the time of publication) who had declined an honour [125] count of his technical expertise; Puffett quoted remarks between 1950 and 1999. by the Professor of Music at Oxford in the 1960s, Sir [12] The writer John Bridcut sees significance in evidence that Jack Westrup, to the effect that Britten was to be dis- Britten mentally regarded himself as perpetually 13 years trusted for his “superficial effects”, whereas Tippett was old. Bridcut views this as manifest both in the Letts di- considered “awkward and technically unskilled but some- aries Britten bought and used well into his adult life, in how authentic.”[36] which he wrote several statistics relevant to himself when [5] Britten later wrote about his youthful discovery of Mahler that age,[144] and in his remark to Imogen Holst, “I'm still that he had been told that the composer was “long-winded thirteen”.[145] and formless ... a romantic self-indulgent, who was so in- fatuated with his ideas that he could never stop. Either he [13] The journalist Martin Kettle wrote in 2012 that although couldn't score at all, or he could only score like Wagner, there is no evidence of wrongful conduct, it is impor- using enormous orchestras with so much going on that you tant that allegations of paedophilia be openly discussed, couldn't hear anything clearly. Above all, he was not orig- both to avoid covering up criminal behaviour and to avoid inal. In other words, nothing for a young student!" Britten oversimplifying the complexity of Britten’s sexuality and [150] judged, on the contrary, “His influence on contemporary creativity. writing ... could only be beneficial. His style is free from excessive personal mannerisms, and his scores are mod- [14] In 1938, Britten attended what was only the second British els of how the modern virtuoso orchestra should be used, performance of Mahler’s Eighth Symphony, the “Sym- nothing being left to chance and every note sounding.”[39] phony of a Thousand”, with Sir Henry Wood and the BBC Symphony Orchestra. Britten declared himself “tremen- [6] Koussevitzky’s generosity later extended to waiving his dously impressed” by the music, though he thought the rights to mount the first production, allowing Britten and performance “execrable”.[169] his Sadler’s Wells associates the chance to do so. The opera’s first performance under Koussevitzky’s aegis was [15] The critics’ outrage at the presumption of Auden and Brit- at the Tanglewood Music Festival in 1947, conducted by ten in writing an American work mirrored the hostile re- the young Leonard Bernstein.[67] Bernstein retained a love sponse of London critics six years earlier when Jerome of the work, and he conducted the orchestral “Sea Inter- Kern and Oscar Hammerstein presented Three Sisters, a [174] ludes” from the opera at his final concert, given in Tangle- musical set in England. wood in 1990, shortly before his death.[68] [16] Matthews comments that the work is “so much more sen- [7] Sadler’s Wells Theatre in Islington, London, was requisi- suous when sung by the soprano voice for which the songs tioned by the government in 1942 as a refuge for people were conceived”.[184] 17

[17] The piece was much admired by Tippett as “one of the [10] Matthews, p. 3 wonderful things in Britten’s music”, an opinion with which Britten apparently concurred.[193] [11] Carpenter, p. 6

[18] The piece is formally sub-titled “Variations and Fugue on [12] Blyth, p. 25 a Theme of Henry Purcell"; Britten greatly disliked the BBC’s practice of referring to the work by the grander [13] Blyth, p. 25; and Powell, p. 16 sub-title in preference to his preferred title.[204] [14] Carpenter, pp. 6–7 [19] Steuart Wilson, a retired singer who held a succession of posts as a musical administrator, launched an outspoken [15] White, p. 2 campaign in 1955 against “homosexuality in British mu- [16] Carpenter pp. 8 and 13 sic” and was quoted as saying: “The influence of perverts in the world of music has grown beyond all measure. If [17] Powell, p. 5 it is not curbed soon, Covent Garden and other precious musical heritages could suffer irreparable harm.”[218] [18] Carpenter, pp. 8–9

[20] In 2006 Gramophone magazine invited eminent present- [19] Carpenter, p. 10 day accompanists to name their “professional’s profes- sional": the joint winners were Britten and Moore.[228] [20] Carpenter, p. 13

[21] Britten once said, “It’s not bad Brahms I mind, it’s good [21] Britten, Benjamin. Notes to Decca LP LW 5162 (1956), [231] Brahms I can't stand”. reproduced in Britten (1991), p. 9

[232] [22] So writes John Bridcut, but Webster’s biographer, [22] David Matthews, Britten, pp. 8-9; accessed 3 September Montague Haltrecht, recounts that no formal offer of 2013 the post was made to Britten. According to Haltrecht, Lord Harewood and other Covent Garden board members [23] Lara Feigel, Alexandra Harris eds, Modernism on Sea: Art wanted Britten for the post, but Webster believed that it and Culture at the British Seaside; accessed 3 September was above all as a composer that Britten could bring glory 2013 to Covent Garden.[233] [24] Carpenter, pp. 13–14 [23] Elgar was an exclusive HMV artist;[236] Walton, after a brief spell with Decca, made most of his recordings for [25] Matthews, p. 8 Columbia.[237] [26] Carpenter, p. 16 [24] Imogen Holst remembered Britten’s recording sessions differently: “He used to find recording sessions more ex- [27] Quoted in Carpenter, p. 17 hausting than anything else, and dreaded the days when he had to stop writing a new opera in order to record the one [28] Mitchell, Donald. “Britten, (Edward) Benjamin, Baron before last.”[239] Britten (1913–1976)", Oxford Dictionary of National Bi- ography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online edition, [25] The set comprises all the composer’s works with opus January 2011. Retrieved 12 May 2103 (subscription or numbers and all works commercially recorded by 2013 UK public library membership required) (many fragments and juvenilia have not been published or recorded). The set includes Britten’s folksong arrange- [29] Carpenter, p. 18 and Oliver, p. 23 ments, but excludes his Purcell realisations.[241] [30] Bridcut (2006): p. 16

References [31] Matthews, p. 11

[1] Matthews, p. 1 [32] Bridcut (2006): p. 17

[2] Kennedy, p. 2 [33] Matthews, p. 14

[3] Evans (2009), p. 513 [34] Craggs, p. 4

[4] Powell, p. 3 [35] Carpenter, p. 35

[5] Carpenter, pp. 4 and 7; Kildea, p. 4; Matthews, p. 2; and [36] Puffett, Derrick. “Benjamin Britten: A Biography by Powell pp. 10–11 Humphrey Carpenter”, Albion: A Quarterly Journal Con- cerned with British Studies, Volume 26, No 2, Summer [6] Blyth, p. 36 1994, pp. 395–396 (subscription required) [7] Kildea, p. 4; and Matthews, p. 3 [37] Cole, Hugo. “Review – Britten”, Tempo, New Series, No [8] Carpenter, pp. 4–5 78, Autumn 1966, pp. 31–32 (subscription required)

[9] Powell, p. 7 [38] Carpenter, p. 40 18 7 NOTES, REFERENCES AND SOURCES

[39] Britten, Benjamin. “On Behalf of Gustav Mahler”, [69] Matthews, p. 79 Tempo, New Series, No 120, March 1977, pp. 14–15, (subscription required) [70] Matthews, p. 66

[40] White, p. 15–16 [71] Gilbert pp. 78, 83 and 98

[41] Carpenter, pp. 48 and 53 [72] Gilbert, p. 98

[42] Oliver, p. 217 [73] See, for example, “Sadler’s Wells Opera – 'Peter Grimes’", The Times, 8 June 1945, p. 6, and Glock, William. “Mu- [43] Carpenter, pp. 62–63 sic”, The Observer, 10 June 1945, p. 2

[44] Powell, p. 92 [74] Banks, pp. xvi–xviii.

[45] Kennedy, p.17 [75] Blyth, p. 79

[46] Carpenter, pp. 104, 105, 148 and 166 [76] Gilbert, p. 107 [47] Matthews, p, 34 [77] Matthews, p. 80 [48] White, Eric Walter. “Britten in the Theatre: A Provi- [78] Carpenter, p. 228 and Matthews, p. 80 sional Catalogue”, Tempo, New Series, No 107, Decem- ber 1973, pp. 2–10 [79] Matthews, pp. 80–81

[49] Matthews, p. 184 [80] “Instruments of the Orchestra”, British Film Institute, ac- [50] Powell, p. 127; and Matthews, p. 38 cessed 24 May 2013

[51] Matthews, pp. 38–39 [81] Matthews, p. 81

[52] Powell, p. 130 [82] Hope-Wallace, Philip. “Opera at Glyndebourne”, The Manchester Guardian, 15 July 1946, p. 3; and Carpen- [53] Carpenter, p. 112 ter, pp. 242–243

[54] Matthews, p. 40 [83] Carpenter, p. 243

[55] Matthews, p. 46 [84] Wood, Anne. “English Opera Group”, The Times, 12 July 1947, p. 5 [56] Robinson, Suzanne. “An English Composer Sees Amer- ica: Benjamin Britten and the North American Press, [85] Headington (1993), pp. 149–150; and Matthews, p. 89 1939–42”, American Music, Volume 15, No 3 (Autumn 1997), pp. 321–351 [86] Headington (1993), p. 151

[57] Brett, Philip, et al. “Britten, Benjamin”, Grove Music On- [87] Matthews, pp. 92–93 line, Oxford Music Online, Oxford University Press, ac- cessed 12 May 2013 (subscription required) [88] Hall, George. “Festival Overtures: Britten in Bloom”, Opera Volume 64.4, April 2013, pp. 436–438 [58] Headington (1993), pp. 87–88 [89] Mason, Colin. “Benjamin Britten’s 'Dream'", The [59] Headington (1993), pp. 91–92 Guardian, 11 June 1960. p. 5; and Greenfield, Edward. “Britten’s Death in Venice”, The Guardian, 18 June 1973, [60] Evans (1979), p. 57 p. 8 [61] Headington (1993), pp. 98–99 [90] Wright, David. “The South Kensington Music Schools [62] Kennedy, p. 31 and the Development of the British Conservatoire in the Late Nineteenth Century”, Journal of the Royal Musical [63] Kennedy, pp. 213, 216 and 256 Association, Oxford University Press, Volume 130 No. 2, pp. 236–282 (Sullivan, Parry and Stanford); McVeagh, [64] Brogan, Hugh. “W. H. Auden, Benjamin Britten, and Paul Diana. “Elgar, Edward”, Grove Music Online, (Elgar); Bunyan”, Journal of American Studies, Volume 32, No 2, Graebe, Martin. “Gustav Holst, Songs of the West, and August 1998, pp. 281–282 (subscription required) the English Folk Song Movement”, Folk Music Journal, Volume 10.1 , 2011, pp. 5–41 (Vaughan Williams and [65] Carpenter, pp. 150–151 Holst); and Clarke, David. “Tippett, Sir Michael", Grove [66] White, p. 35 Music Online, Oxford University Press. All (subscription required), accessed 24 May 2013 [67] Powell, p. 252 [91] Heseltine, Philip. “Some Notes on Delius and His Music”, [68] Rockwell, John. “The Last Days of Leonard Bernstein”, The Musical Times, March 1915, pp. 137–142 (subscrip- The New York Times, 16 October 1990 tion required) 19

[92] Kirkbride, Jo. “William Walton (1902–1983), Two [117] Maxwell Davies, Peter, Nicholas Maw and others. Pieces from Henry V (1944)", Scottish Chamber Orches- “Benjamin Britten: Tributes and Memories”, Tempo, New tra, accessed 24 May 2013 Series, No. 120, March 1977, pp. 2–6 (subscription re- quired) [93] “Ballets de Paris de Roland Petit – 'Le Rêve de Léonor'", The Times, 27 April 1949, p. 3 [118] Evans, Peter. “Britten’s Television Opera”, The Musical Times, Volume 112, No. 1539, May 1971, pp. 425–428 [94] Carpenter, p. 214 (subscription required)

[95] Blom, Eric. “Britten’s 'Billy Budd'", The Observer, 2 De- [119] Piper, p. 15 cember 1951, p. 6; Hope-Wallace, Philip. “Britten’s Billy Budd", The Manchester Guardian, 3 December 1951, p. [120] Graham, p. 55 5; and Porter, Andrew. “Britten’s Billy Budd", Music & [121] Oliver, p. 206 Letters, Volume 33, No. 2, April 1952, pp. 111–118 [122] Carpenter, p, 596 [96] Porter, Andrew. Britten’s Gloriana, Music & Letters, Vol. 34, No. 4 (October 1953), pp. 277–287 (subscription [123] The London Gazette: no. 46954. p. 9295. 6 July 1976. required) [124] Powell, p. 458 [97] Matthews, p. 107 [125] Rosenbaum, Martin. “Government forced to release list [98] Greenfield, Edward. “Gloriana at Sadler’s Wells”, The of rejected honours”, BBC, 26 January 2012, accessed 24 Guardian, 22 October 1966, p. 6 May 2013; and List of honours refused, Cabinet Office, January 2012 [99] Christiansen, Rupert. “Gloriana: Britten’s problem opera”, The Daily Telegraph 18 June 2013; and Church, [126] Headington (1996), p. 143 Michael. “Richard Jones’s revelatory ROH revival of Brit- ten’s underrated Gloriana”, The Independent 21 June 2013 [127] Kennedy, p. 114

[100] Mason, Colin. “Britten’s New Opera at Venice Festival: [128] Matthews, p. 154 Welcome for 'The Turn of the Screw'", The Manchester [129] Matthews, p. 155 Guardian, 15 September 1954, p. 5 [130] Powers, Alan. “Reynolds Stone: A Centenary Tribute”, [101] “Operas, Britten”, Operabase, accessed 25 May 2013 Fine Press Book Association, accessed 27 May 2013

[102] Weeks, pp. 239–240 [131] Headington (1993), p. 277

[103] Carpenter, p. 334 [132] “Memorial service: Lord Britten, OM, CH”, The Times, 11 March 1977, p. 20 [104] Carpenter, p. 335 [133] Ford, p. 77; and Begbie and Guthrie, pp. 192–193 [105] Britten (2008), p. 388 [134] Carpenter, p. 113 [106] Britten (2008), p. 441 [135] Carpenter, p. 114 [107] Carpenter, pp. 434–435 and 478–480 [136] Carpenter, p. 486 [108] Mann, William, “Queen opens concert hall”, The Times, 3 June 1967, p. 7; and Greenfield, Edward, “Inaugural [137] Carpenter, p. 654 Concert at the Maltings, Snape”, The Guardian, 3 June [138] Matthews, pp. 3–4; and Keates, Jonathan. “It was boy- 1967, p. 7 ishness Britten loved as much as boys”, The Sunday Tele- [109] Greenfield, Edward. “Queen at new Maltings concert”, graph, 11 June 2006 The Guardian, 6 June 1970, p. 1 [139] Carpenter, p. 302

[110] Mann, William. “Shostakovich special”, The Times, 15 [140] Kildea, p. 202 June 1970, p. 10 [141] Carpenter, pp. 384–385 (Mackerras) and 444–445 [111] Matthews, p. 124 (Harewood).

[112] Carpenter, p. 482 [142] Blyth, p. 139

[113] Matthews, pp. 124–125 and 127 [143] Matthews, p. 96

[114] Ray, p. 155 [144] Bridcut (2006), pp. 1–2

[115] Matthews, p. 127 [145] Bridcut (2006), p. 8

[116] Blyth, p. 151 [146] Bridcut (2006), p. 3 20 7 NOTES, REFERENCES AND SOURCES

[147] Bridcut (2006), plate 13; and Carpenter, pp. 356–358 and [172] List of top composers, Operabase, accessed 28 April 385 2011.

[148] Carpenter, p. 164 [173] Britten-Pears Foundation press release, accessed 28 April 2011. [149] Bridcut (2006), p. 6 [174] Banfield, p. 224 [150] Kettle, Martin. “Why we must talk about Britten’s boys”, The Guardian, 21 November 2012 [175] ODNB; Greenfield, Edward. “Inspired genius oblivious to musical fashion”, The Guardian, 6 December 1976, p. 7; [151] Toronyi-Lalic, Igor. “Paul Kildea’s erudite biography Seymour, pp. 19, 77, 116 and 216, underplays Benjamin Britten’s dark side”, The Daily Telegraph, 11 February 2013; and Morrison, Richard. [176] Kildea, pp. 2–3; Seymour, pp. 19–20; and Powell, p. 233 “Crossing the line between affection and abuse”, The [177] “The Turn of the Screw”, Britten-Pears Foundation, ac- Times, 9 May 2006 (subscription required) cessed 26 June 2013

[152] Carpenter, pp. 356–358; Miller, Lucasta. “Ben and [178] “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” Britten-Pears Founda- his boys: Britten’s obsession with adolescents is sensi- tion, accessed 26 June 2013 tively handled”, The Guardian, 1 July 2006; and Keates, Jonathan. “It was boyishness Britten loved as much as [179] “Death in Venice”, Britten-Pears Foundation, accessed 26 boys”, The Sunday Telegraph, 11 June 2006 June 2013

[153] Kildea, pp. 532–535 [180] Keller, Hans. “Britten and Mozart”, Music and Letters, January 1948, pp. 17–30 (subscription required) [154] Petch, Michael, Opera, April 2013, p. 414. [181] Matthews, p. 102 [155] Higgins, Charlotte. “Benjamin Britten syphilis 'extremely unlikely', says cardiologist”,The Guardian, 22 January [182] Matthews, p. 91 2013 [183] Mason, Colin. “Benjamin Britten”, The Musical Times, [156] Kildea, Paul. “The evidence does show Britten died from Vol. 89, No. 1261 (March 1948), pp. 73–75 (subscrip- syphilis”, The Guardian, 30 January 2013 tion required)

[157] Morrison, Richard. “The temptation to settle old scores [184] Matthews, p. 56 – A centenary biography of Britten should not be judged [185] Mason, Colin. “Benjamin Britten (continued)", The Musi- by just one sensational speculation – the rest is fascinating cal Times, Vol. 89, No. 1262 (April 1948), pp. 107–110 and convincing”, The Times, 4 February 2013 (subscription required)

[158] Matthews, p. 4 [186] Matthews, pp. 120–121

[159] Schafer, p. 119 [187] Matthews, pp. 125–127

[160] Matthews, p. 9 [188] Matthews, pp. 146 and 185–188

[161] Matthews, p. 144 [189] “Canticle I”, “Canticle II”, “Canticle III”, “Canticle IV”, and “Canticle V”, Britten-Pears Foundation, accessed 30 [162] Whittall, pp. 273–274 June 2013

[163] Carpenter, p. 39 [190] Matthews, pp. 98–99

[164] Paul Kildea, Benjamin Britten: A Life in the Twentieth Cen- [191] Schafer, p. 121 tury, p. 78 [192] Matthews, p. 111 [165] Whittall, p. 104 [193] Carpenter, p. 305 [166] Brett, p. 125 [194] Whittall, pp. 162–164 [167] Matthews, pp. 20–23 [195] Matthews, p. 140 [168] Letter to Henry Boys, 29 June 1937, quoted in Matthews, [196] Carpenter, p. 565 p. 22 [197] Whittall, p. 272 [169] Kennedy, Michael. “Mahler’s mass following”, The Spec- tator, 13 January 2010 [198] Matthews, p. 153

[170] Whittall, p. 203 [199] Richards, Denby (1977). Notes to Chandos CD 8376

[171] “Operas”, Britten-Pears Foundation, accessed 26 June [200] Glass, Herbert. “Sinfonia da Requiem”, Los Angeles 2013 Philharmonic, accessed 26 June 2013 21

[201] Posner, Howard. “Four Sea Interludes”, Los Angeles Phil- [232] Bridcut (2012), p. 173 harmonic, accessed 26 June 2013 [233] Haltrecht, pp. 185–186 [202] Headington (1996), p. 82 [234] Bridcut (2012), pp. 173–176 [203] Matthews, p. 85 [235] Bridcut (2012), pp. 175–176 [204] Carpenter, p. 231 [236] Philip, Robert, “The recordings of Edward Elgar (1857– [205] Matthews, pp. 128 and 183 1934): Authenticity and Performance Practice”, Early Music, November 1984, pp. 481–489 (subscription re- [206] Powell, p. 382 quired) [207] Matthews, pp. 46–48 [237] Greenfield, Edward, “The Music of William Walton”, [208] “Britten, Benjamin: Violin Concerto”, Boosey and Gramophone, October 1994, p. 92 Hawkes, accessed 30 June 2013 [238] Culshaw, John, “Ben – A Tribute to Benjamin Britten [209] Mann, pp. 295–311 (1913–1976)", Gramophone, February 1977, p. 21

[210] Foreman, Lewis. Benjamin Britten and 'The Rescue', [239] Holst, Imogen. “Working for Benjamin Britten”, The Mu- Tempo, September 1988, pp. 28–33 (subscription re- sical Times, March 1977, pp. 202–204 and 206 (subscrip- quired) tion required)

[211] Mann, p. 303 [240] Culshaw, p. 339

[212] Matthews, pp. 188–189 [241] “Decca announces first Britten complete works”, Brit- ten100, Britten-Pears Foundation, 16 May 2013 [213] Keller, Hans. “Benjamin Britten’s Second Quartet”, Tempo, March 1947, pp. 6–9 (subscription required) [242] The London Gazette: (Supplement) no. 39863. p. 2976. 1 June 1953. Retrieved 20 October 2015. [214] Anderson, Colin, “Britten – 'Phantasy Quartet'; String Quartet No. 3; Bliss – Oboe Quintet”, Fanfare, March [243] The London Gazette: no. 43610. p. . 26 March 1965. 2007, pp. 87–88. Retrieved 20 October 2015.

[215] Carpenter, p. 448 [244] “Britten, Baron”, Who Was Who, A & C Black, online edition, Oxford University Press, December 2007, ac- [216] Chissell, Joan. “Little Masterpieces”, The Times, 26 June cessed 24 May 2013 (subscription required) 1976, p. 11 [245] “Grammy Hall of Fame”, Grammy.org, accessed 24 May [217] Tippett, p. 117 2013 [218] The People, 24 July 1955, cited in Britten (2004), p. 7 [246] “Visit The Red House”, Britten-Pears Foundation, ac- [219] Tippett, p. 214 cessed 24 May 2013

[220] Bernstein, in the TV documentary A Time There Was, [247] “Benjamin Britten studio restored”, The Daily Telegraph, quoted by Carpenter, p.590 14 June 2013

[221] Carpenter, pp. 590–91 [248] “Britten-Pears Archive opens in Aldeburgh”, Gramo- phone, 14 June 2013 [222] Steinberg, p. 643 [249] “Benjamin Britten”, Westminster Abbey, accessed 24 [223] “Tony Palmer Filmography”. www.tonypalmer.org. Re- May 2013 trieved 2013-10-12. [250] “City of Westminster green plaques”, Westminster City [224] Whittall, pp. 299–301 Council, accessed 24 May 2013

[225] Oliver, p. 213 [251] “Islington Borough plaques”, Islington Borough Council, accessed 24 May 2013 [226] Blyth, pp. 18–19 and 92 [252] “Great Britons”, Royal Mail, accessed 24 May 2013 [227] Moore, p. 252

[228] Gramophone, Volume 83, 2006, pp. 38–39 [253] Greenfield, Edward. Notes to EMI CD CDM 7 64723 2 (1986) [229] Stuart, Philip. Decca Classical 1929–2009, accessed 24 May 2013. [254] “Arts News”, The Herald, 15 March 2013

[230] Blyth, p. 171 [255] Taylor, Paul. “Bennett the maestro returns with a multi- layered masterpiece”, The Independent 18 November [231] Blyth, p. 88 2009 22 7 NOTES, REFERENCES AND SOURCES

[256] “It’s begun – Biggest ever celebration of a British com- • Britten, Benjamin (2008). Reed, Philip; Cooke, poser underway”, Britten100, Britten-Pears Foundation, Mervyn; Mitchell, Donald Mitchell, eds. Letters accessed 24 May 2013. from a Life: The Selected Letters of Benjamin Brit- ten, Volume IV, 1952–1957. London: The Boydell [257] “Benjamin Britten – Peace and Conflict”, benjaminbrit- Press. ISBN 9781843833826. tenfilm.co.uk, accessed 24 May 2013; and French, Philip. “Benjamin Britten: Peace and Conflict – review”, The Ob- • Carpenter, Humphrey (1992). Benjamin Britten: server, 26 May 2013 A Biography. London: Faber and Faber. ISBN [258] “Poetry in Sound: The Music of Benjamin Britten (1913– 0571143245. 1976)", The British Library, accessed 15 June 2013 • Craggs, Stewart R (2002). Benjamin Britten: A Bio- [259] “Royal Mint unveils commemorative Britten coin” bibliography. Westport, Conn: Greenwood Publish- Gramophone, 1 September 2013 ing. ISBN 031329531X.

[260] “Britten events worldwide”, Britten100, Britten-Pears • Culshaw, John (1981). Putting the Record Straight. Foundation, accessed 15 June 2013 London: Secker & Warburg. ISBN 0436118025.

[261] “Grimes on the Beach”, aldeburgh.co.uk, accessed 17 • Evans, John (2009). Journeying Boy: The Diaries June 2013; and “In pictures: Britten’s Peter Grimes on of the Young Benjamin Britten 1928–1938. London: Aldeburgh beach”, BBC, 18 June Faber and Faber. ISBN 0571238831.

[262] Clement, Andrew. “Grimes on the Beach”, The Guardian, • Evans, Peter (1979). The Music of Benjamin Britten. 19 June 2013 London: J M Dent. ISBN 0460043501.

[263] Tommasini, Anthony. " Britten at 100: An Original’s • Ford, Andrew (2011). Illegal Harmonies: Music Legacy”, The New York Times, 7 June 2013 in the Modern Age (third ed.). Collingwood, Vic: Black. ISBN 1863955283. Sources • Gilbert, Susie (2009). Opera for Everybody. Lon- don: Faber and Faber. ISBN 0571224938. • Banfield, Stephen; Geoffrey Holden Block (2006). Jerome Kern. New Haven, Connecticut: Yale Uni- • Graham, Colin (1989) [1979]. “Staging first pro- versity Press. ISBN 0300138342. ductions”. In David Herbert. The Operas of Ben- jamin Britten. London: Herbert Press. ISBN • Banks, Paul (2000). The Making of Peter Grimes: 1871569087. Essays and Studies. Woodbridge: Boydell Press. ISBN 0851157912. • Haltrecht, Montague (1975). The Quiet Showman: Sir David Webster and the Royal Opera House. Lon- • Begbie, Jeremy; Steven R Guthrie (2011). Resonant don: Collins. ISBN 0002111632. Witness: Conversations between Music and Theol- ogy. Grand Rapids, Michigan: W B Eerdmans. • Headington, Christopher (1996). Britten. Illustrated ISBN 0802862772. Lives of the Great Composers. London: Omnibus Press. ISBN 0711948127. • Brett, Philip (ed.) (1983). Benjamin Britten: Peter Grimes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. • Headington, Christopher (1993) [1992]. Peter ISBN 9780521297165. Pears: A Biography. London: Faber and Faber. ISBN 0571170722. • Bridcut, John (2006). Britten’s Children. London: Faber and Faber. ISBN 0571228399. • Kennedy, Michael (1983). Britten. London: J M Dent. ISBN 0460022016. • Bridcut, John (2012). The Essential Britten. Lon- don: Faber and Faber. ISBN 0571290736. • Kildea, Paul (2013). Benjamin Britten: A life in the twentieth century. London: Penguin Books. ISBN • Britten, Benjamin (1991). Donald Mitchell, ed. 9781846142338. Letters From a Life: The Selected Letters of Benjamin Britten, Volume I, 1923–1939. London: Faber and • Mann, William (1952). “The Incidental Music”. In Faber. ISBN 057115221X. Mitchell, Donald and Keller, Hans (eds). Benjamin Britten: A Commentary on his Works from a Group • Britten, Benjamin (2004). Donald Mitchell, ed. of Specialists. Rockliff. OCLC 602843346. Letters from a Life: The Selected Letters of Benjamin Britten, Volume III, 1946–1951. London: Faber and • Matthews, David (2013). Britten. London: Haus Faber. ISBN 057122282X. Publishing. ISBN 1908323388. 23

• Moore, Gerald (1974) [1962]. Am I Too Loud? – • Britten Thematic Catalogue, Britten Project Memoirs of an Accompanist. Harmondsworth: Pen- • guin. ISBN 0140024808. Boosey & Hawkes (Britten’s publishers up to 1963): biographies, work lists and descriptions, recordings, • Oliver, Michael (1996). Benjamin Britten. London: performance schedules Phaidon Press. ISBN 0714832774. • Faber Music (Publisher set up by Britten for his • Powell, Neil (2013). Britten: A Life for Music. Lon- works after 1963): biography, work lists, record- don: Hutchinson. ISBN 0091931231. ings, performance schedules

• Piper, Myfanwy (1989) [1979]. “Writing for Brit- • MusicWeb International. Benjamin Britten (1913– ten”. In David Herbert. The Operas of Ben- 1976), by Rob Barnett jamin Britten. London: Herbert Press. ISBN • 1871569087. National Portrait Gallery. Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten (1913–1976), 109 portraits. • Ray, John (2000). The Night Blitz: 1940–1941. London: Cassell. ISBN 030435676X.

• Schafer, Murray (1963). British Composers in Interview. London: Faber and Faber. OCLC 460298065.

• Seymour, Claire Karen (2007). The operas of Ben- jamin Britten – Expression and Evasion. Wood- bridge: Boydell Press. ISBN 184383314X.

• Steinberg, Michael (1998). The Symphony – A Lis- tener’s Guide. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0195061772.

• Tippett, Michael (1994). Those Twentieth Century Blues. London: Pimlico Books. ISBN 0712660593.

• Weeks, Jeffrey (1989). Sex, Politics and Society. London: Longman. ISBN 0582483336.

• White, Eric Walker (1954). Benjamin Britten: His Life and Operas. New York: Boosey & Hawkes. ISBN 0520016793.

• Whittall, Arnold (1982). The Music of Britten and Tippett. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521235235.

8 External links

• Britten-Pears Foundation

• Britten 100 (Britten-Pears Foundation’s website for the Britten centenary)

• Aldeburgh Music (The organisation founded by Benjamin Britten in 1948, originally as Aldeburgh Festival: the living legacy of Britten’s vision for a festival and creative campus)

• Britten material in the BBC Radio 3 archives

• Gresham College: “Britten and Bridge”, lecture and performance investigating the relation between the two composers, 5 February 2008 (available for download as text, audio or video file) 24 9 TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES

9 Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

9.1 Text

• Benjamin Britten Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Britten?oldid=699378568 Contributors: AxelBoldt, Tarquin, An- dre Engels, Danny, Deb, William Avery, Heron, Camembert, Rbrwr, Nevilley, Edward, Michael Hardy, Ellywa, Cferrero, Darkwind, Александър, GCarty, John K, EdH, Norwikian, Hashar, JerryW, I am not Albert Herring, Hyacinth, Cleduc, Paul-L~enwiki, Wilus, Bcorr, Proteus, Bearcat, Robbot, Pigsonthewing, Moriori, Dumbledad, Postdlf, Mervyn, Wally, UtherSRG, JackofOz, Tobias Berge- mann, Snobot, Stirling Newberry, Nunh-huh, Everyking, Henry Flower, Nick04, Guanaco, Thomas Ludwig, Solipsist, RcktScientistX, Fys, DavidBrooks, Antandrus, MarkSweep, SimonArlott, Pmanderson, Marcus2, Imjustmatthew, Trevor MacInnis, D6, Haiduc, Discospin- ster, Rich Farmbrough, Avriette, Guanabot, Jesper Laisen, YUL89YYZ, Autiger, Bender235, Jnestorius, Neatnate, CanisRufus, Smalljim, Anon customer, Schissel, Alansohn, Ben davison, Philip Cross, M7, Craigy144, Lord Pistachio, Riana, Ciceronl, Chrisjohnson, Snowolf, Ksnow, Saga City, Mtiedemann, Cburnett, Dave.Dunford, SteinbDJ, PullUpYourSocks, Pcpcpc, Nuno Tavares, Angr, FeanorStar7, Uris, Dionyziz, CPES, Emerson7, Graham87, Cuchullain, Kbdank71, Rjwilmsi, Wahoofive, Koavf, Саша Стефановић, Missmarple, TBHecht, Nomet, FlaBot, RobertG, JdforresterBot, Draktorn, Flowerparty, DrGeoduck, Fervidfrogger, Mallocks, Gareth E. Kegg, Chobot, Jaraalbe, DVdm, Melodia, RussBot, ReubenB, Insouciance, Stephen Burnett, Grafen, Ruhrfisch, Tony1, Htonl, Gadget850, David Underdown, Wknight94, Crisco 1492, Homagetocatalonia, Nikkimaria, Banana04131, JRawle, Kubra, Stevouk, Pfistermeister, Tim1965, Ranthlee, Auroranorth, Finell, AndyJones, Bluewave, SmackBot, Espresso Addict, David Kernow, KnowledgeOfSelf, Delldot, Ilikeeatingwaffles, HeartofaDog, IstvanWolf, Gaff, Ian Rose, Gilliam, Oscarthecat, Chris the speller, Thumperward, Kleinzach, FordPrefect42, Schi, Viva- Verdi, Colonies Chris, Daddy Kindsoul, Philipvanlidth, OrphanBot, Onorem, Snowmanradio, Rrburke, Makemi, Thunk, GuillaumeTell, Rob~enwiki, Smerus, Le baron, Tim riley, Ceoil, Ohconfucius, Tony Sandel, Michael David, SashatoBot, Dono, Ser Amantio di Nico- lao, John, Salmonforgey, Timclare, Michael Bednarek, Ckatz, N1h1l, Voceditenore, 16@r, JHunterJ, BillFlis, Slakr, Mr Stephen, Waggers, Neddyseagoon, Hu12, Martynelmy, Burto88, Iridescent, Shingleton, Beno1000, Courcelles, Wspencer11, Cmulrooney, JohnCD, Nunquam Dormio, WeggeBot, Cydebot, Cahk, Valodzka, Ladyribena, Gogo Dodo, DavidRF, DumbBOT, Nabokov, Ssilvers, Goldenlane, Epbr123, MarkBuckles, Edwardx, Massimo Macconi, PaulVIF, AntiVandalBot, Fatidiot1234, Yonmei, Sean Parmelee, DShamen, P.D., JAnD- bot, MER-C, Dsp13, Dybryd, Rothorpe, Bencherlite, VoABot II, Xn4, Jerome Kohl, Tedickey, Cgingold, Cpl Syx, Mokgamen, Kraxler, MartinBot, Chrisrick, CommonsDelinker, Pharaoh of the Wizards, DrKay, W2bh, Mind meal, Cpsa, Gadsby West, Sallyrob, DJRafe, Memestream, Oakshade, Ipigott, AntiSpamBot, Vstrad7, Fortepiano, Vully, Robertgreer, Sunderland06, Cometstyles, Ja 62, Straw Cat, Roaring phoenix, Caspian blue, VolkovBot, Alfietucker, Sjones23, Martinevans123, TXiKiBoT, Krzysiulek~enwiki, Vipinhari, Technopat, DevAlt, Mathwhiz 29, Anonymous Dissident, Clevelander96, PatrickWaters, Don4of4, Feudonym, David Couch, ClassicMusic, Sealman, AlleborgoBot, Gustav von Humpelschmumpel, RyanDavid12, Scarian, Steorra, Karaboom, Composer information, Rjeffcoat, Ted007, Oda Mari, Kate bassett, KoshVorlon, Radavenport, OwenParamore, Oniscoid, Stfg, Almufasa, James5521, Hifihitman, Budhen, Jamesfranklin- gresham, Lethesl, ClueBot, Sdurrant, Impossible triangle, The Thing That Should Not Be, All Hallow’s Wraith, Bellperc, Niceguyedc, Moonbada, Solar-Wind, Altris77, DragonBot, Stepshep, Excirial, Richard92t, Rufer, Hrdinský, Promethean, Tnxman307, Brianboulton, Kaiba, 6afraidof7, Light show, GFHandel, Kontakion, Wally Tharg, Avoided, SilvonenBot, NellieBly, Mm40, Edgepedia, Mountdray- ton, Bridgetfox, HexaChord, Totanilla, Janinho, Addbot, Proofreader77, Experimental Hobo Infiltration Droid, Willking1979, Guoguo12, Rafhabbaniya, Ronhjones, CanadianLinuxUser, Download, Vega2, Redheylin, Favonian, Stefania.saccani, Rogersansom, Lightbot, Shal- laq, Legobot, Luckas-bot, Yobot, Themfromspace, Ptbotgourou, Amirobot, DisillusionedBitterAndKnackered, Classicalgenius, TheFi- nalSay, Visitchief192, Szajci, AnomieBOT, Andrewrp, Galoubet, Fanoftheworld, Edcerv, Flewis, Dendlai, Citation bot, Frankenpuppy, LilHelpa, MauritsBot, Xqbot, Tall-timothy, DanielS-78, The Land Surveyor, XxAznEmoxX, Anna Frodesiak, Christybullen321, Mudkip- slol, Majoo027, BoomerAB, FrescoBot, Anna Roy, Crog62, LeMiklos, Atlantia, Gerbilschool, Scarabocchio, RedBot, AKD157, Gerda Arendt, Melthamman, DumbeLLirnia, Lotje, Sebmelmoth, LilyKitty, SeoMac, Cassianto, Schwede66, Jeffrd10, MacGilvennehy, Diannaa, Xavidxohnson, Tbhotch, Allbysun, DARTH SIDIOUS 2, Whisky drinker, LorenzoFiorilini, Elton Bunny, Lidiader, GoingBatty, RA0808, RenamedUser01302013, Wikipelli, K6ka, Mz7, Yiosie2356, Fdsal;fjh, EricWesBrown, Donner60, BENAMBROSE, Puffin, RayneVan- Dunem, Rettinghaus, ClueBot NG, Mikemkuk, Gareth Griffith-Jones, Jasonbook99, Movses-bot, Poshseagull, Jlg80, Widr, Antiqueight, RafikiSykes, Jorgenev, Casmeltzer, Zachariass, AlterBerg, SchroCat, Delcoursolutions, CityOfSilver, Poiuytrewqqwertyuioppp, Graham11, MusikAnimal, Budlea11, Toccata quarta, Jfhutson, Nimahafezieh, Ninmacer20, ChrisGualtieri, Khazar2, EuroCarGT, Marosc9, Magic- stars, Pgboultbee, Dexbot, Knuand, Shoelstadlen, VIAFbot, SFK2, Graham AM2012, Erikwithuhk, MaybeMaybeMaybe, Aoulou, Melvyn Elphee, VoxelBot, Beniaminobritten, Nonsenseferret, Tooteruse, George8211, Macclesfieldnath, Muhammadusman2323, Mal y pense, Be- yondallmeaning, Scriptorscorpionis, Swagggy987654, Hel-hama, XXWeAreLegionXx, Raj5835, Allznmb, Monkbot, Cashmanian, Amor- tias, Narky Blert, Dlíodóir95, Nutshell9, Kevache123, Sashashea, Whatwehavehereisfailuretocommunicate, Hellohelloeverybodyimback, Datbubblegumdoe, Re5x, Opera Madonna, Srbernadette and Anonymous: 367

9.2 Images

• File:AudenVanVechten1939.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/aa/AudenVanVechten1939.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: Van Vechten Collection at Library of Congress Original artist: Carl Van Vechten • File:Ballerina-icon.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3a/Ballerina-icon.jpg License: CC-BY-SA-3.0 Contributors: • Snowdance.jpg Original artist: Snowdance.jpg: Rick Dikeman • File:Benjamin_Britten,_London_Records_1968_publicity_photo_for_Wikipedia.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/ wikipedia/commons/3/30/Benjamin_Britten%2C_London_Records_1968_publicity_photo_for_Wikipedia.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: eBay listing of publicity photograph from London Records, which marketed records to the United States. Original artist: According to information on the photograph, it was originally taken by photographer Hans Wild for High Fidelity magazine (published in the United States). • File:Benjamin_Britten_137_Cromwell_Road_blue_plaque.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fb/ Benjamin_Britten_137_Cromwell_Road_blue_plaque.jpg License: CC BY-SA 4.0 Contributors: Own work Original artist: Edwardx • File:Benjamin_Britten_grave_by_Arno_Drucker.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9e/Benjamin_ Britten_grave_by_Arno_Drucker.jpg License: CC BY-SA 2.0 Contributors: Flickr: Benjamin Britten grave Original artist: Arno Drucker 9.3 Content license 25

• File:Benjamin_Britten_memorial_window_..._-_geograph.org.uk_-_1131630.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/ commons/4/43/Benjamin_Britten_memorial_window_..._-_geograph.org.uk_-_1131630.jpg License: CC BY-SA 2.0 Contributors: From geograph.org.uk Original artist: Zorba the Geek • File:Birthplace_of_Benjamin_Britten.JPG Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8a/Birthplace_of_Benjamin_ Britten.JPG License: CC BY-SA 3.0 Contributors: Own work Original artist: Hel-hama • File:Britten-poets.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/2c/Britten-poets.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: • File:Courbet - Paul Verlaine.jpg Original artist: ? • File:Commons-logo.svg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/4a/Commons-logo.svg License: CC-BY-SA-3.0 Contribu- tors: ? Original artist: ? • File:Folder_Hexagonal_Icon.svg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/48/Folder_Hexagonal_Icon.svg License: Cc-by- sa-3.0 Contributors: ? Original artist: ? • File:Frank-bridge-1921.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/63/Frank-bridge-1921.jpg License: PD-US Contrib- utors: ? Original artist: ? • File:Mahler-Ireland-Stravinsky-Shostakovich.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/3b/ Mahler-Ireland-Stravinsky-Shostakovich.jpg License: PD-US Contributors: ? Original artist: ? • File:Peter-grimes-the-borough-1812.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/3e/Peter-grimes-the-borough-1812. jpg License: Public domain Contributors: ? Original artist: ? • File:Peter_Pears_publicity_photo_1971_crop_jpeg.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/17/Peter_Pears_ publicity_photo_1971_crop_jpeg.jpg License: Public domain Contributors: eBay listing of publicity photograph from NET Opera Theater on PBS, which broadcasts television programs in the United States. Original artist: Unknown, distributed by PBS • File:RIAN_archive_25562_Mstislav_Rostropovich_and_Benjamin_Britten_after_a_concert.jpg Source: https://upload. wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/69/RIAN_archive_25562_Mstislav_Rostropovich_and_Benjamin_Britten_after_a_concert.jpg License: CC BY-SA 3.0 Contributors: RIA Novosti archive, image #25562, http://visualrian.ru/ru/site/gallery/#25562 35 mm film / 35 мм негатив Original artist: Mikhail Ozerskiy / Михаил Озерский • File:Sharp.svg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a6/Sharp.svg License: Public domain Contributors: 's file Original artist: • File:Snape_Maltings_Concert_Hall,_Snape,_Suffolk_(2).jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1a/ Snape_Maltings_Concert_Hall%2C_Snape%2C_Suffolk_%282%29.jpg License: CC BY-SA 2.0 Contributors: Snape Maltings Concert Hall, Snape, Suffolk Original artist: Amanda Slater from Coventry, England • File:The_Scallop,_Maggi_Hambling,_Aldeburgh.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a7/The_Scallop% 2C_Maggi_Hambling%2C_Aldeburgh.jpg License: CC BY-SA 2.0 Contributors: ? Original artist: ?

9.3 Content license

• Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0