5023363019026

Britten: Britten To America

Samuel West, Andrew Kennedy, Jean Rigby, Ex Cathedra, Halle, Mark Elder

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Format: CD

Cat No: NMCD190

Release Date:  09 December 2013

Label:  NMC Recordings

Packaging Type:  Jewel Case

No of Units:  1

Barcode:  5023363019026

Genres:  Classical  Contemporary  

  • Description

    What better way to mark the end of Britten's centenary than release some unrecorded works, the majority of which haven't been heard since they were performed in the 1940s. This is Britten with a difference - there are blues numbers, jazz, a 'Tibetan' chant, a Bach chorale and even a ukulele player.

    Britten made the hazardous journey from the United States back to England in the spring of 1942. Within a few weeks he had face a Tribunal exempting him from military service as a conscientious objector. In his statement to the Tribunal he had said "I believe sincerely that I can help my fellow human beings best, by continuing the work I am best qualified to do", and almost immediately he began giving concerts with Peter Pears in towns, rural villages and prisons. He also wrote major scores for radio propaganda programmes, including An American in England, six programmes about wartime conditions in England produced by the BBC for live transmission in the USA by CBS; and Britain to America, three programmes as part of a weekly transmission by NBC.

    Music from these two series is accompanied by incidental music to two plays by Auden and Isherwood: The Ascent of F6 and On the Frontier; and Roman Wall Blues, from a lost radio production with Auden, Hadrian's Wall.

  • Tracklisting

      Disc 1

      Side 1

      • 1. Overture
      • 2. Entr'actes for Mr & Mrs A.
      • 3. Entr'acte and Gunn's Song
      • 4. O Brothers!
      • 5. Pantomime
      • 6. Mother's Song
      • 7. Act II Prelude
      • 8. Chant
      • 9. Climbing Music
      • 10. Gunn's Song
      • 11. Climbing Music
      • 12. Cabaret Jazz Song
      • 13. O Senseless Hurricanes
      • 14. Funeral March and Chorus
      • 15. Blues: Stop All the Clocks
      • 16. Mother's Song With Chorus
      • 17. Chorale
      • 18. London By Clipper
      • 19. Dover to London
      • 20. Ration Island
      • 21. London
      • 22. You Walk Down to a Part of the City
      • 23. Warren. To My Dearly Beloved Boy
      • 24. It's a Beautiful August Morning
      • 25. Within 50 Yards
      • 26. Your First Factory
      • 27. After the Last War
      • 28. You Set Out for a Training Camp
      • 29. Roman Wall Blues
      • 30. Overture
      • 31. Ad Libitum
      • 32. The Clock On the Wall Has an Electric Tick
      • 33. Prisoner's Monologue
      • 34. Fanfare, Act I, Scene I
      • 35. Moderato, After Act I, Scene I
      • 36. Fanfare, Act III, Scene II
      • 37. Marching Songs
      • 38. Ostnian National Anthem
      • 39. Waltz
      • 40. Journalists' Song
      • 41. Interlude
      • 42. End Chorus
      • 43. Britain to America: Where Do We Go from Here?