A Suffolk Celebration

John Constable, ‘The Hay Wain’ (1821), oil on canvas.

The figure of Benjamin Britten looms large over British music of the last century, too often at the expense of his coevals. His legacy remains almost unshakeable, while composers like Michael Tippett have endured a posthumous decline in popularity which is only beginning to turn a corner. Granted, this has not always been the case: the stardom enjoyed by Tippett in the 1960s as Britten’s operas fell flat is well charted in Oliver Soden’s magnificent 2019 biography. A recent surge in enthusiasm for Tippett’s music owes much to Soden, and to other champions like Edward Gardner, but the revival is still in its early days.  

It was therefore something of a surprise for me to learn that these two musical titans were connected not just by friendship, rivalry, or historical coincidence, but by geographical origins too. There is no question that Britten is the paradigmatic Suffolk composer, his work inextricably bound to the county and its cultural heritage. From Peter Grimes to the Aldeburgh Festival, Britten left an indelible mark on East Anglia. But an hour’s drive from the coastal town where the composer was born, one finds the beautiful, somnolent village of Wetherden. A stone’s throw from the village’s church lies the childhood home of Michael Tippett.

Although Tippett rooted himself beyond the borders of Suffolk as an adult, the prospect of bringing his music to life at the site of his earliest musical experiences was immediately appealing. The temptation grew when I realised that Wetherden neighbours the village of Bacton, where poet and novelist Zadie Loft grew up. Ten of Zadie’s poems have recently entered the guitar repertoire via a major new song cycle by Jonty Lefroy Watt, Roma Indicta. It was all too inviting, then, to unite the guitar works of these Suffolk stalwarts in a single programme, which Mia Serracino-Inglott and I will deliver on 21st September at St Mary’s Church, Wetherden. Completing the programme is a work by Priaulx Rainier, a close friend and collaborator of both Tippett and Britten, whose Dance of the Rain for voice and guitar was premiered at the Aldeburgh Festival in 1961.

The concert will take place at 7pm on 21st September at St Mary’s Church, IP14 3LB. To reserve a ticket (£10), please contact Ann Cooke at trevorcooke228@btinternet.com.  

Full programme details below:

Michael Tippett (1905–98) The Blue Guitar

i.                Transforming

ii.              Juggling

iii.             Dreaming

Priaulx Rainier (1903–86) Dance of the Rain  

Benjamin Britten (1913–76) Folksong Arrangements 

i.               I Will Give My Love an Apple

ii.             Sailor Boy

iii.            The Soldier and the Sailor

iv.            The Shooting of his Dear

Jonty Lefroy Watt (2000–) Roma Indicta 

Words by Zadie Loft (2000–)

i.               Rome Upturned

ii.             Judith's Dinner

iii.            Arch

iv.            Tarpeia Has her Say

v.              Atlas

vi.            To Arria I

vii.          Mary's Portrait

viii.         To Arria II

ix.            He Stole Parts of Me

x.              A Sliver of Sky

xi.            Epilogue