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Benjamin Britten, pianist, conductor, educator, composer of a wide range of music from large-scale operas and choral works to string quartets and songs, is acknowledged as a pivotal figure in mid-twentieth-century Britain. This volume explores the contexts for his multi-faceted career and his engagement with his contemporaries in music, art, literature, and film, British musical institutions, royal and governmental entities, and the church, as well as his ground-breaking projects, philosophical and ideological tenets. The book is thematically structured in five parts: Britten's relationships with Peter Pears, his close friends, mentors, and colleagues; musical life in Britain; his interactions with previous and contemporary generations of composers; his professional work with choreographers, librettists, stage designers, and directors; and his socio-cultural, religious, and political environment. The chapters shed light on the many opportunities and challenges of post-war British musical life that shaped Britten's creative output.

Music --- History and criticism. --- Britten, Benjamin, --- Criticism and interpretation. --- Britten, Edward Benjamin --- Britten, Benjamin --- Britten, Benjamin E. --- History and criticism

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Britten, Benjamin

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'It's a life of the two of us.'

This volume comprises the complete surviving correspondence between Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears. The 365 letters written throughout their 39-year relationship are here brought together and published, as Pears intended, for the first time. While the correspondence provides valuable evidence of the development of Britten's works, more significant is theinsight into his relationship with Pears and their day-to-day life together. Entertaining to read, domestic and intimate, the letters provide glimpses of cultural and artistic life in the twentieth century, including pacifism and conscientious objection, critical assessments of music and other artists, transport and communications development in the twentieth century, the 'Aldeburgh corpses', artcollecting, gossip, everyday life in an English country house, the development of the Aldeburgh Festival, performance practice in early music, looking after dachshunds, travel, and a host of other topics. Above all, when read together, Britten and Pears's letters allow the clearest possible look 'behind the scenes' of one of the most productive creative partnerships of the twentieth century.

VICKI P. STROEHER is Professor of Music History at Marshall University where she is also Coordinator of the Music History & Literature area.

NICHOLAS CLARK is the Librarian at the Britten-Pears Foundation at The Red House, Britten and Pears's home in Aldeburgh, Suffolk.

JUDE BRIMMER is an Archivist at the Britten-Pears Foundation.

Britten, Benjamin, --- Pears, Peter, --- Pirz, Piter, --- Пирз, Питер, --- Friends and associates. --- England. --- Angleterre --- Anglii͡ --- Anglija --- Engeland --- Inghilterra --- Inglaterra --- Britten, Edward Benjamin --- Britten, Benjamin --- Britten, Benjamin E. --- Composers --- Tenors (Singers) --- BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Composers & Musicians. --- Britain. --- English history. --- English music. --- Ireland. --- biography. --- diaries. --- friendship. --- history of English music. --- letters. --- memoir. --- music history. --- musicians. --- musicology. --- primary sources.

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Britten, Benjamin