Word: britten
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...Contemporary Music, which used to play host to such startling modern operas as Igor Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress and Dmitry Shostakovich's The Lady Macbeth of Mzensk, last week unveiled a collaboration between two chilly and notably elegant talents: Britain's Composer Benjamin Britten and America's late, great Author Henry James. The work: Britten's opera version of The Turn of the Screw...
Venice's handsome La Fenice theater was festively decked with roses as the full-dress crowd drifted in from gondolas. On hand in person to conduct the world premiere, wearing a white suit and red tie, was Composer Britten, 40. On a stark stage, British Tenor Peter Pears sang the prologue ("It is a curious story. I have it written in faded ink . . ."). From then on. the plot followed the outlines of the Henry James chiller about a young governess in an English country house who attempts to protect her young charges from the evil doings of a pair...
...William Walton stands second in England's current trinity of famous composers. Less prolific than either 80-year-old Ralph Vaughan Williams or 39-year-old Benjamin Britten, he has turned out some pieces (e.g., his Symphony and Viola Concerto) that are considered better than any of their more celebrated works. In the U.S. he is known for Façade, an impudent accompaniment for Edith Sitwell's eccentric verses; Belshazzar's Feast, a big dramatic choral work; and Orb and Sceptre, a grandiose march commissioned for the coronation. Visiting the U.S. with his Argentine born wife...
...Britten: Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge (Boyd Neel String Orchestra; London). Composed when he was 23, this work shows Britten's wit and enthusiasm at its best. Perhaps because it was inspired by a melodious theme of his teacher, Frank Bridge, it is also more tuneful than most latter-day Britten. Among its movements: a march, a Viennese waltz, a funeral march...
...occasion was a music festival run by Composer Benjamin Britten in Aide-burgh, 85 miles northeast of London. With Composer Britten conducting, Brain performed Haydn's First Concerto for Horn. The piece itself is not one of Haydn's most memorable,* but Brain's music poured out such glistening darts and gentle flutters of sound that the concerto seemed momentous. He conquered the opening and closing fast movements with sparkling virtuosity, and gave the slow middle movement a beautiful, butter-smooth tone. At the end, he took five bows before a roaring audience, then sat down...