Britten's "Peter Grimes"

Synopsis

On today's date in 1945, a month after the end of war in Europe, a new opera by the English composer Benjamin Britten debuted at Sadler's Wells Theater in London. Its title was "Peter Grimes," with its story based on George Crabbe's long poem, The Borough, published in 1810, which described life along England's North Sea coast.

In the early 1940's, Britten was living in America, and had read Crabbe's poem in California. The commission for the opera was also American, coming from Serge Koussevitzky, conductor of the Boston Symphony and one of the leading music patrons of the day.

But Britten's opera is intensely English—evoking, as it does, the images and sounds of the North Sea off the east coast of Suffolk. Britten was born within sight of this seascape, and lived, for the better part of his later life, a little farther down the coast at Aldeburgh—the "Borough," on which George Crabbe had based his poem.

From the start, "Peter Grimes" was an immediate success. Leonard Bernstein conducted its American premiere at the Tanglewood Festival, and within three years the opera was playing around the world. Within a week of its June 7th premiere, Britten conducted the London Philharmonic in an orchestral suite of "Sea Interludes" from his new opera, and these, too, have since firmly established themselves in the concert repertory.

Music Played in Today's Program

Benjamin Britten (1913 - 1976) Sea Interludes, fr Peter Grimes London Symphony; André Previn, cond. EMI 72658

On This Day

Births

• 1897 - Hungarian born American conductor and occasional composer/arranger George Szell, in Budapest; He was led the Cleveland Orchestra from 1946 until the time of his death in 1970;

Deaths

• 1863 - Austrian composer Franz Xaver Gruber, age 75, in Hallen (near Salzburg); He composed the famous Christmas Carol, “Silent Night” (Stille Nacht), in 1818, while serving as a church organist and schoolmaster in Oberndorf;

Premieres

• 1896 - Hugo Wolf: opera "Der Corregidor" (The Governor) (1st version) in Mannheim at the Nationaltheater;

• 1920 - Gershwin: musical revue, "George White's Scandals of 1920," at the Globe Theater in New York City;

• 1922 - American premiere of Vaughan Williams: "Pastoral" Symphony (no.3), at the Litchfield County Choral Festival in Norfolk, Conn., with the composer conducting.; The world premiere had taken place in London on Jan. 26, 1922;

• 1927 - Prokofiev: ballet, "Pas d'Acier," in Paris, by the Ballet Russe;

• 1933 - Weill: "The Seven Deadly Sins of the Bourgeoisie," in Paris; text by Bertolt Brecht;

• 1945 - Britten: opera "Peter Grimes," in London at Sadler's Wells Theater;

• 1951 - Dutilleux: Symphony No. 1, in Paris;

• 1972 - Copland: "Three Latin American Sketches," at Philharmonic Hall (now Avery Fisher Hall) in New York City, by New York Philharmonic conducted by André Kostelanetz;

• 1984 - Crumb: "A Haunted Landscape," by the New York Philharmonic, Arthur Weisberg conducting.