Mein Schöner Garten Spezial

Benjamin Britten has been described as the greatest English composer since Henry Purcell, and although a substantial passage of time separates the two, they shared similar musical preoccupations and principles. Britten said of Purcell: “He was open to many influences, he was a practical composer, he wrote for many different occasions… all that I find immensely sympathetic. Above all, I love his setting of words. I had never realised before I first met Purcell’s music that words could be set with such ingenuity, with such colour.” In 1959, Britten wrote of the warm response he and his partner, tenor Peter Pears, received for their performances of Purcell: “In practically every one of our concerts, given the length of three continents over the last twenty years, Peter Pears and I have included a group of Purcell’s songs… It is pleasant to get cheers at the end of Purcell’s ‘Alleluia’ in the home of Schubert and Wolf, requests for a repeat of ‘Man is for the woman made’ in the birthplace of Mozart… and an impressive silence as the last bars of ‘Job’s Curse’ die away in Düsseldorf, where Schumann spent many years.”