Two Portraits for Strings (1930)

Name: Two Portraits for Strings (1930) - Livro - Benjamin Britten - Music Sales - Viola, String Orchestra
Brand: Music Sales
Price: 23.80 EUR
Availability: OutOfStock

23,80 €

Editora:Music Sales

Disponibilidade:Por Encomenda

Descrição

Britten's Two Portraits for strings - the composer himself called them 'Sketches' - were composed in August and September 1930, during the summer holidays preceding the sixteen-year-old composer's first term at the RoyalCollege of Music, in London.

Both are musical depictions of character, the first portraying Britten's school friend, David Layton, and the second, introducing a solo Viola (Britten's own string instrument), a self-portraitof the composer. According to Britten's diary, he planned to compose a third portrait, again for strings, that was to depict another school friend, Peter Floyd, but this movement was not written. However, David Layton was to beportrayed again, though very differently, in Britten's later quartet suite, Alla Quartetto Serioso (1933), itself revised and re-titled in 1936 as Three Divertimenti.

The Pencil manuscript score, in theBritten-Pears Library at Aldeburgh, although hastily written, is very detailed, ad dynamics and phrasing are carefully notated throughout. However in several places in the first 'Portrait' the notes themselves are either difficultto decipher, or, due to the highly chromatic nature of the music, difficult to interpret - in some cases Britten has clearly made notational 'spelling' mistakes, which have been silently corrected in this editon. A list ofthose places where the reading of the manuscript is doubtful may be obtained from the Britten-Pears Library, Aldeburgh.

As with virtually all orchestral music from his youth, Britten did not hear either 'Portrait'performed. The first performance of Two Portraits was given by the Northern Sinfonia, conducted by Martyn Brabbins, broadcast by BBC Radio 3 on 5th December 1995, as part of a series entitled 'Britten's Apprenticeship'.The first concert performance of Portrait No.1 was given by the Britten Chamber Orchestra conducted by Andreas Mitisek, at the Konzerthaus, Schubert-Saal, Vienna, on 10th February 1996. The first concert performance of