Benjamin Britten
The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra
Benjamin Britten was a prolific British composer of works in many genres:
operas, symphonies, chamber pieces, choral works, and even music for
documentaries. Some of his most popular works are nearly always in production
somewhere, including the opera Peter Grimes (1945), the War Requiem (1961),
or the seasonal choral favorite, A Ceremony of Carols (1943).
Britten considered himself a modernist and was influenced by Berg, Stravinsky
and Mahler, but he was equally affected by older forms and was particularly fond
of English Baroque musician Henry Purcell (1659–1695). Britten's music makes
use of both classical and post-modern styles, and is often considered more "accessible"
to general audiences than other composers of his period. His dramatic and
concert works are strikingly similar in their themes of innocence lost (Billy
Budd, 1951; The Prodigal Son, c.1964), conflicts between the outsider
and society (Peter Grimes; Death in Venice, 1973), or the struggle
between morality and lurking evil (The Rape of Lucretia, 1946; The
Turn of the Screw, 1954).
Britten wrote The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra in 1946 as
part of the score to a documentary film designed for children; the work
consequently includes several sotto voce sections meant for the film‘s
narration. The piece begins with the full orchestra playing a sweeping, stately
theme based on one by Purcell. Britten then briefly introduces each section of
the orchestra: woodwinds, brass, strings, and percussion each play their own
variation on the theme.
Next, Britten produces a veritable Who's Who of the full orchestra. Each
instrument is provided an ingenious variation that both stresses that instrument's
particular characteristics and demonstrates how it is typically used within the
orchestra. The flutes make the first appearance in a flurry of birdlike notes,
followed by a sinuous oboe duet. The clarinets play a rippling, humorous line,
and the bassoon shows both its lyrical ability and almost percussive quality in
the lower register.
The strings enter in an extended section that evolves from a lively dance to
a stately, singing theme carried mainly by the cellos. The basses get their
moment in the spotlight too, dancing above woodwinds and tambourine. Then
another stringed instrument makes itself heard: the harp modulates upward in
rippling chords and glissandos.
Horns sound swelling chords against strings and percussion, then the trumpets
take off in a brisk tune reminiscent of a hunting call. Trombones and tuba show
off their sonority, followed by an inventory of the percussion section. Alert
listeners can hear timpanum, bass drum, cymbal, tambourine, triangle, snare
drum, wood block, xylophone, castanet, gong, and even slapstick, each used in a
way that shows how percussion can augment or complete other instruments'
lines.
At last the piccolo introduces a fugue, itself a variation on Purcell's
theme, that Britten uses to "reassemble" the full orchestra, adding each
instrument back in the same order in which they were just demonstrated
individually. As the fugue reaches its peak, the original Purcell theme returns
in counter-point and brings the piece to a resounding, triumphant close.
November 21, 1999
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