Peter Pears
Encyclopedia
Sir Peter Neville Luard Pears CBE
(icon ;
22 June 1910 – 3 April 1986) was an English
tenor
who was knighted in 1978. His career was closely associated with the composer
Edward Benjamin Britten
.
He was born at Newark House, Searle Road, Farnham
, Surrey
, and educated at Lancing
. He went on to study music at Keble College, Oxford
, serving as organist at Hertford College
, but left without taking his degree. He later studied voice for two terms at the Royal College of Music
. He claimed that it was hearing the tenor Steuart Wilson
singing the Evangelist in J.S. Bach
's St Matthew Passion that "started me off".
In 1936, while a member of the BBC Singers
, he met Benjamin Britten, who was to become his lover. Pears and Britten gave their first recital together in 1937 at Balliol College, Oxford University. In early 1939, Britten and Pears left for America together as pacifists, a few months before the outbreak of war between the British Empire and Germany. There, in 1940, Britten composed Seven Sonnets of Michelangelo, the first of many song cycle
s for Pears. Upon their return to England in 1942, when they both registered as conscientious objectors, they performed the song cycle at Wigmore Hall
on 23 September, and then recorded them for EMI
, their first recording together.
Many of Britten's works contain a main tenor role written specifically for Pears. These include the Nocturne, the Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings
, the Canticles, the operas Peter Grimes
and Albert Herring
(title roles), his adaption of The Beggar's Opera
(Macheath), Owen Wingrave
(Sir Philip Wingrave), Billy Budd
(Captain Vere), The Turn of the Screw
(Quint), Death in Venice
(Aschenbach) and the three Church Parables.
Pears was co-librettist for A Midsummer Night's Dream
, and created one of his few comic roles in it. As Flute the bellows-mender, he performed a drag parody of Dame Joan Sutherland
in the mad scene of Lucia di Lammermoor
.
His voice was controversial, the vocal quality being unusual. Felix Benson described it as "dry and white" and that "it took some getting used to". It was cruelly said that he had one good note, E a third above middle C, which is why the crucial aria of Peter Grimes
, "Now the Great Bear and Pleiades", is mainly written on that note. Its quality did not always record well, but there is no doubt that he had unusually good articulation and vocal agility, of which Britten also took advantage. His delivery, and Britten's compositional style, were mercilessly (and accurately) satirised by Dudley Moore
in Beyond the Fringe
(Little Miss Muffet
).
He made his Metropolitan Opera
début in October 1974 as Aschenbach in Death in Venice
. He sang regularly at the Royal Opera House
and other major opera houses in Europe and the United States.
During his life he was considered a notable interpreter of Franz Schubert
's Lieder, usually with Britten as accompanist. He also gave notable performances as the Evangelist in Bach's Passions.
Pears, a Sponsor of the Peace Pledge Union
, died at Red House, Aldeburgh
, Suffolk
, and is buried in the churchyard
of St Peter and St Paul's Church in Aldeburgh
, Suffolk
. Benjamin Britten
's grave is next to his, near the grave of Imogen Holst
, a close friend.
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...
(icon ;
22 June 1910 – 3 April 1986) was an English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
tenor
Tenor
The tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...
who was knighted in 1978. His career was closely associated with the composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
Edward Benjamin Britten
Benjamin Britten
Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
.
He was born at Newark House, Searle Road, Farnham
Farnham
Farnham is a town in Surrey, England, within the Borough of Waverley. The town is situated some 42 miles southwest of London in the extreme west of Surrey, adjacent to the border with Hampshire...
, Surrey
Surrey
Surrey is a county in the South East of England and is one of the Home Counties. The county borders Greater London, Kent, East Sussex, West Sussex, Hampshire and Berkshire. The historic county town is Guildford. Surrey County Council sits at Kingston upon Thames, although this has been part of...
, and educated at Lancing
Lancing College
Lancing College is a co-educational English independent school in the British public school tradition, founded in 1848 by Nathaniel Woodard. Woodard's aim was to provide education "based on sound principle and sound knowledge, firmly grounded in the Christian faith." Lancing was the first of a...
. He went on to study music at Keble College, Oxford
Keble College, Oxford
Keble College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. Its main buildings are on Parks Road, opposite the University Museum and the University Parks. The college is bordered to the north by Keble Road, to the south by Museum Road, and to the west by Blackhall...
, serving as organist at Hertford College
Hertford College, Oxford
Hertford College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. It is located in Catte Street, directly opposite the main entrance of the original Bodleian Library. As of 2006, the college had a financial endowment of £52m. There are 612 students , plus various visiting...
, but left without taking his degree. He later studied voice for two terms at the Royal College of Music
Royal College of Music
The Royal College of Music is a conservatoire founded by Royal Charter in 1882, located in South Kensington, London, England.-Background:The first director was Sir George Grove and he was followed by Sir Hubert Parry...
. He claimed that it was hearing the tenor Steuart Wilson
Steuart Wilson
Sir James Steuart Wilson was an English singer, known for tenor roles in oratorios and concerts in the first half of the 20th century....
singing the Evangelist in J.S. Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...
's St Matthew Passion that "started me off".
In 1936, while a member of the BBC Singers
BBC Singers
The BBC Singers are the professional chamber choir of the BBC. As one of six BBC Performing Groups, the 24-voiced choir has been in existence for more than 80 years. The BBC Singers have commissioned and premiered works by the leading composers of the past century, including Benjamin Britten, Sir...
, he met Benjamin Britten, who was to become his lover. Pears and Britten gave their first recital together in 1937 at Balliol College, Oxford University. In early 1939, Britten and Pears left for America together as pacifists, a few months before the outbreak of war between the British Empire and Germany. There, in 1940, Britten composed Seven Sonnets of Michelangelo, the first of many song cycle
Song cycle
A song cycle is a group of songs designed to be performed in a sequence as a single entity. As a rule, all of the songs are by the same composer and often use words from the same poet or lyricist. Unification can be achieved by a narrative or a persona common to the songs, or even, as in Schumann's...
s for Pears. Upon their return to England in 1942, when they both registered as conscientious objectors, they performed the song cycle at Wigmore Hall
Wigmore Hall
Wigmore Hall is a leading international recital venue that specialises in hosting performances of chamber music and is best known for classical recitals of piano, song and instrumental music. It is located at 36 Wigmore Street, London, UK and was built to provide London with a venue that was both...
on 23 September, and then recorded them for EMI
EMI
The EMI Group, also known as EMI Music or simply EMI, is a multinational music company headquartered in London, United Kingdom. It is the fourth-largest business group and family of record labels in the recording industry and one of the "big four" record companies. EMI Group also has a major...
, their first recording together.
Many of Britten's works contain a main tenor role written specifically for Pears. These include the Nocturne, the Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings
Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings
The Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings is a song cycle written in 1943 by the English composer Benjamin Britten, scored for tenor accompanied by a solo horn and a small string orchestra...
, the Canticles, the operas Peter Grimes
Peter Grimes
Peter Grimes is an opera by Benjamin Britten, with a libretto adapted by Montagu Slater from the Peter Grimes section of George Crabbe's poem The Borough...
and Albert Herring
Albert Herring
Albert Herring, Op. 39, is a chamber opera in three acts by Benjamin Britten.Composed in the winter of 1946 and the spring of 1947, this comic opera was a successor to his serious opera The Rape of Lucretia...
(title roles), his adaption of The Beggar's Opera
The Beggar's Opera
The Beggar's Opera is a ballad opera in three acts written in 1728 by John Gay with music arranged by Johann Christoph Pepusch. It is one of the watershed plays in Augustan drama and is the only example of the once thriving genre of satirical ballad opera to remain popular today...
(Macheath), Owen Wingrave
Owen Wingrave
Owen Wingrave is an opera for television in two acts with music by Benjamin Britten, his Opus 85, and a libretto by Myfanwy Piper, after a short story by Henry James....
(Sir Philip Wingrave), Billy Budd
Billy Budd (opera)
Billy Budd is an opera by Benjamin Britten, from a libretto by E. M. Forster and Eric Crozier, was first performed at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London on 1 December 1951. It is based on the short novel Billy Budd by Herman Melville....
(Captain Vere), The Turn of the Screw
The Turn of the Screw (opera)
The Turn of the Screw is a 20th century English chamber opera composed by Benjamin Britten with a libretto by Myfanwy Piper, "wife of the artist John Piper, who had been a friend of the composer since 1935 and had provided designs for several of the operas". The libretto is based on the novella...
(Quint), Death in Venice
Death in Venice (opera)
Death in Venice is an opera in two acts by Benjamin Britten, his last. The opera is based on the novella Death in Venice by Thomas Mann. Myfanwy Piper wrote the English libretto. It was first performed at Snape Maltings near Aldeburgh, England on 16 June 1973.The astringent score is marked by some...
(Aschenbach) and the three Church Parables.
Pears was co-librettist for A Midsummer Night's Dream
A Midsummer Night's Dream (opera)
A Midsummer Night's Dream is an opera with music by Benjamin Britten and set to a libretto adapted by the composer and Peter Pears from William Shakespeare's play, A Midsummer Night's Dream...
, and created one of his few comic roles in it. As Flute the bellows-mender, he performed a drag parody of Dame Joan Sutherland
Joan Sutherland
Dame Joan Alston Sutherland, OM, AC, DBE was an Australian dramatic coloratura soprano noted for her contribution to the renaissance of the bel canto repertoire from the late 1950s through to the 1980s....
in the mad scene of Lucia di Lammermoor
Lucia di Lammermoor
Lucia di Lammermoor is a dramma tragico in three acts by Gaetano Donizetti. Salvadore Cammarano wrote the Italian language libretto loosely based upon Sir Walter Scott's historical novel The Bride of Lammermoor....
.
His voice was controversial, the vocal quality being unusual. Felix Benson described it as "dry and white" and that "it took some getting used to". It was cruelly said that he had one good note, E a third above middle C, which is why the crucial aria of Peter Grimes
Peter Grimes
Peter Grimes is an opera by Benjamin Britten, with a libretto adapted by Montagu Slater from the Peter Grimes section of George Crabbe's poem The Borough...
, "Now the Great Bear and Pleiades", is mainly written on that note. Its quality did not always record well, but there is no doubt that he had unusually good articulation and vocal agility, of which Britten also took advantage. His delivery, and Britten's compositional style, were mercilessly (and accurately) satirised by Dudley Moore
Dudley Moore
Dudley Stuart John Moore, CBE was an English actor, comedian, composer and musician.Moore first came to prominence as one of the four writer-performers in the ground-breaking comedy revue Beyond the Fringe in the early 1960s, and then became famous as half of the highly popular television...
in Beyond the Fringe
Beyond the Fringe
Beyond the Fringe was a British comedy stage revue written and performed by Peter Cook, Dudley Moore, Alan Bennett, and Jonathan Miller. It played in London's West End and then on New York's Broadway in the early 1960s, and is widely regarded as seminal to the rise of satire in 1960s Britain.-The...
(Little Miss Muffet
Little Miss Muffet
"Little Miss Muffet" is a nursery rhyme, one of the most commonly printed in the mid-twentieth century. It has a Roud Folk Song Index number of 20605.-Lyrics:-Alternative Lyrics:...
).
He made his Metropolitan Opera
Metropolitan Opera
The Metropolitan Opera is an opera company, located in New York City. Originally founded in 1880, the company gave its first performance on October 22, 1883. The company is operated by the non-profit Metropolitan Opera Association, with Peter Gelb as general manager...
début in October 1974 as Aschenbach in Death in Venice
Death in Venice (opera)
Death in Venice is an opera in two acts by Benjamin Britten, his last. The opera is based on the novella Death in Venice by Thomas Mann. Myfanwy Piper wrote the English libretto. It was first performed at Snape Maltings near Aldeburgh, England on 16 June 1973.The astringent score is marked by some...
. He sang regularly at the Royal Opera House
Royal Opera House
The Royal Opera House is an opera house and major performing arts venue in Covent Garden, central London. The large building is often referred to as simply "Covent Garden", after a previous use of the site of the opera house's original construction in 1732. It is the home of The Royal Opera, The...
and other major opera houses in Europe and the United States.
During his life he was considered a notable interpreter of Franz Schubert
Franz Schubert
Franz Peter Schubert was an Austrian composer.Although he died at an early age, Schubert was tremendously prolific. He wrote some 600 Lieder, nine symphonies , liturgical music, operas, some incidental music, and a large body of chamber and solo piano music...
's Lieder, usually with Britten as accompanist. He also gave notable performances as the Evangelist in Bach's Passions.
Pears, a Sponsor of the Peace Pledge Union
Peace Pledge Union
The Peace Pledge Union is a British pacifist non-governmental organization. It is open to everyone who can sign the PPU pledge: "I renounce war, and am therefore determined not to support any kind of war...
, died at Red House, Aldeburgh
Aldeburgh
Aldeburgh is a coastal town in Suffolk, East Anglia, England. Located on the River Alde, the town is notable for its Blue Flag shingle beach and fisherman huts where freshly caught fish are sold daily, and the Aldeburgh Yacht Club...
, Suffolk
Suffolk
Suffolk is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in East Anglia, England. It has borders with Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south. The North Sea lies to the east...
, and is buried in the churchyard
Churchyard
A churchyard is a patch of land adjoining or surrounding a church which is usually owned by the relevant church or local parish itself. In the Scots language or Northern English language this can also be known as a kirkyard or kirkyaird....
of St Peter and St Paul's Church in Aldeburgh
Aldeburgh
Aldeburgh is a coastal town in Suffolk, East Anglia, England. Located on the River Alde, the town is notable for its Blue Flag shingle beach and fisherman huts where freshly caught fish are sold daily, and the Aldeburgh Yacht Club...
, Suffolk
Suffolk
Suffolk is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in East Anglia, England. It has borders with Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south. The North Sea lies to the east...
. Benjamin Britten
Benjamin Britten
Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...
's grave is next to his, near the grave of Imogen Holst
Imogen Holst
Imogen Clare Holst, CBE was a British composer and conductor, and sole child of composer Gustav Holst.Imogen Holst was brought up in west London and educated at St Paul's Girls' School, where her father was director of music...
, a close friend.