BENJAMIN BRITTEN, A LIFE IN MUSIC
By Timothy Gilbert
Timothy Gilbert lives in quiet retirement at home in Walsall – and he has produced an illuminating book on Benjamin Britten, exploring aspects of the composer’s work rarely touched on before.
More of that later, but first I ask him about the path which brought him to a love of one of this country’s greatest composers.
“I went to Queen Mary’s Grammar School in Walsall, and then on to Sidney Sussex College in Cambridge to read History. But in order to escape Physics at ‘O’-level four of us opted to take ‘O’-level music; I was the only one who passed!
“I had taken clarinet lessons up to Grade 3 and 4, but had given up on the piano after Grade 1 because of the pressures at the Grammar School. But Radio 3’s ‘This Week’s Composer’ was a wonderful companion!
“One of the set works for ‘O’-level was Britten’s St Nicolas cantata, and I was captivated by its melodic freshness, and its resourcefulness deployed so skilfully for amateurs, and the congregational hymns I like very much.
“In those days -- this was 1969 – there was still an interest in serious newspapers about classical music, and a new piece by Britten or Tippett or Shostakovich would actually be an event.”
At this point I have to interrupt Tim to tell him that once during an interview at the Barber Institute Sir Michael Tippett told me as a scoop that he was composing a new piece for the BBC Proms – and that story made it onto the front page of the Birmingham Post next morning.
We move on to discuss Tim’s “Benjamin Britten, A Life of Music”, another of Brewin Books’ beautiful productions, and indeed a well-structured consideration of the composer’s life and works. It also carries an endorsement of its early sketches given by no less a personage than the tenor Peter Pears, Britten’s life-long partner. How did that accolade come about?
“About 45 years ago, during a period of illness, I decided to write a piece about Britten’s life (it’s been heavily revised since then), and I sent this piece of writing to Peter Pears, and he replied favourably.
“But much later, a couple pf years ago, it seemed to me that I’d like to revisit it. The composer David Matthews, and an assistant to Britten, read the whole thing through, and I added two further sections about aspects which I felt had been overlooked It seemed to me to be important to write about his influences, his friends, his circle, and the other section was about Britten as performer, and David Matthews thought that was particularly valuable.”
I couldn’t agree more with Matthews. Tim Gilbert’s discussion of Britten’s performances, whether live or on record, is of great significance. Britten was active as conductor (his recording of Elgar’s Dream of Gerontius is a wake-up call to those who expect an incense-laden snooze), as an accompanist (his Schubert Winterreise with Peter Pears chills to the marrow), and as a duet partner.
On Britten’s personal relationships, Tim is more coy than I would have expected. He talks about the composer’s “fatherly interest” in the young boys, the actor David Hemmings among them, whose parents willingly sent to him, perhaps not knowing they were to share his bed. There is a book, “Britten’s Children” by John Bridcut, which I couldn’t bear to continue reading.
We conclude by discussing Tim Gilbert’s devotion to the Presteigne Festival, set in the delightfully sleepy Welsh Marches, and which has long had George Vass as its Artistic Director. Vass was Walsall-born and bred, and his family and the Gilberts have always been close.
Tim is an ever-present at this early-autumn festival combining classical and user-friendly contemporary music, and has indeed dedicated this Britten book “with admiration and affection” to George Vass.
Christopher Morley
*Benjamin Britten, a Life of Music” is published by Brewin Books (£6.95)
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