Book contents
- Benjamin Britten in Context
- Composers in Context
- Benjamin Britten in Context
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Notes on Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Bibliographic and In-Text Abbreviations
- Prologue
- Part I The Britten Circle(s)
- Part II British Musical Life
- Part III Britten and Other Composers
- Part IV Wordsmiths, Designers, and Performers
- Chapter 24 W. H. Auden
- Chapter 25 Eric Crozier
- Chapter 26 Two Librettists
- Chapter 27 The Wise, Queer Heart of Englishness
- Chapter 28 William Plomer’s Poetics of Exile at Home
- Chapter 29 ‘Don’t Colour Them, the Music Will Do That’
- Chapter 30 Designing and Dancing Britten
- Chapter 31 Pears as Illuminator, Interpreter, and Inspiration
- Chapter 32 Britten’s Singers
- Chapter 33 Britten’s Performers: Those Most ‘Instrumental’
- Part V British Sociocultural, Religious, and Political Life
- Further Reading
- Index
Chapter 29 - ‘Don’t Colour Them, the Music Will Do That’
Myfanwy Piper and Britten’s Marriage of Words and Music
from Part IV - Wordsmiths, Designers, and Performers
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 31 March 2022
- Benjamin Britten in Context
- Composers in Context
- Benjamin Britten in Context
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Notes on Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Bibliographic and In-Text Abbreviations
- Prologue
- Part I The Britten Circle(s)
- Part II British Musical Life
- Part III Britten and Other Composers
- Part IV Wordsmiths, Designers, and Performers
- Chapter 24 W. H. Auden
- Chapter 25 Eric Crozier
- Chapter 26 Two Librettists
- Chapter 27 The Wise, Queer Heart of Englishness
- Chapter 28 William Plomer’s Poetics of Exile at Home
- Chapter 29 ‘Don’t Colour Them, the Music Will Do That’
- Chapter 30 Designing and Dancing Britten
- Chapter 31 Pears as Illuminator, Interpreter, and Inspiration
- Chapter 32 Britten’s Singers
- Chapter 33 Britten’s Performers: Those Most ‘Instrumental’
- Part V British Sociocultural, Religious, and Political Life
- Further Reading
- Index
Summary
Benjamin Britten did more than any other composer since Henry Purcell to promote the genre of English opera and its use of the English language. There is less consensus on the contribution made by Myfanwy Piper as Britten’s librettist for The Turn of the Screw, Owen Wingrave, and Death in Venice. Even a limited degree of familiarity with her libretti for Britten induces admiration owing to the precision behind her choice of word and phrase and the way they it can enhance immediacy. She herself has observed that all three libretti that she wrote for Britten were based on sophisticated texts. In his librettist, Britten trusted his closest concerns: someone who could translate the drama in the literary texts into taut succinct scenes; manage abrupt changes of mood; dovetail each scene neatly into the next so that narrative suspense is was sustained; and who could also manage pace, climax, and dramatic development with tact and sensibility. In all this Myfanwy Piper excelled, and she remains unsurpassed in the economy with which she handled words.
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- Benjamin Britten in Context , pp. 256 - 263Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2022