Page 10-11 - WINTER 2013
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WINTER 2013
10
11
To celebrate LGBT
History month and the
100th anniversary of
his birth, our Gay Great
this month is a man
who made a hugely
significant contribution
to modern classical
music and whose work
introduced thousands of
children to the orchestra.
Edward Benjamin Britten was born on 22nd November 1913. His father was a dentist
named Robert and the family lived a distinctly middleclass lifestyle. His mother, Edith,
was a music lover and the family would often hold performance evenings at home
for their friends. Britten was also arguably the last ever British composer to grow up
without recorded music. His father resolutely banned gramophones and there was no
wireless in the house. Instead, Britten learned piano and was taught by his mother to
begin with and later by more qualified teachers. In 1924 at the age of just 11, one of
his teachers took him to the Norfolk and Norwich Music Festival. There he heard a
performance of The Sea by Frank Bridge.
He was captivated and a few years later, he
was introduced to Bridge who was impressed
by the boy and wanted to take him on as a
pupil.
Britten continued school at the insistence
of his father and travelled to London
frequently for lessons with Bridge. But after
only a few years at regular school, Britten
won a scholarship for the Royal College of
Music. There he continued private lessons
with Bridge while also studying under John
Ireland and Ralph Vaughan Williams. His
time there was productive and he won many
of the top young composer prizes.
When he left, he found work very quickly
with the BBC composing music for
documentaries. He was assigned to work
with the famous poet W G Auden, a move
which proved a turning point in his life.
While Britten had worked hard to supress
his homosexuality, Auden embraced it and
had many sexual partners. He went on to
work with Auden for many years. His first
years in composing were highly productive
and in 1935-1937, he wrote an amazing 40
different works. The first composition to
bring Britten to the public consciousness
was A Boy Was Born, written for and
performed by the BBC singers in 1934.
1937 was a turning point in Britten’s life.
His beloved mother died, which while sad,
gave him the freedom to follow his own
path. Not long after, he met the singer Peter
Pears. The two became very close friends,
devoted to each other’s company. When the
war broke out in 1939, they both moved to
America, primary because they had both
campaigned against the war and considered
themselves pacifists. Around this time, their
friendship also took a romantic turn and
the couple remained partners for the rest of
Britten’s life.
Life in America was short-lived as Britten
missed the UK too much. He and Pears
returned home and applied for conscientious
objector status, which they were granted.
Not long after coming back, both of them
started working with Sadler’s Wells Opera
Company with singer Jean Cross. However
a mixture of infighting and homophobia
made all three of them leave and set up the
English Opera Group instead, which ran for
many years.
One of Britten’s last and most famous works
was War Requiem, a piece written especially
for the consecration of the new Coventry
Cathedral, which was destroyed during
the Blitz. A trip Britten made to Belsen
concentration camp to play for survivors
before was said to have inspired much of his
music after, including the War Requiem.
In 1973, Britten suffered a slight stroke
after an operation to fit a new heart valve.
It meant he was unable to move his right
hand and had to give up performing. A few
years after Britten was given a life peerage,
he died of congested heart failure. Before
his death, he was offered a formal burial in
Westminster Abby. However, he refused as
his last wish was to be buried in his home
church in Aldeburgh, side by side with his
life partner Pears.
Gay
great
–Benjamin Britten
