Episode 372. Pears Sings Not-Britten (Pride 2025)
SOCIAL SHARE
SUBSCRIPTION PLATFORM
Today may be my final episode for Pride Month 2025, but it is most certainly not my final episode celebrating and affirming Pride and all our glorious forebears who preceded us! Today’s episode is a belated birthday tribute to British tenor Peter Pears (22 June 1910 – 03 April 1986), most celebrated for his long-standing romantic and musical partnership with Benjamin Britten. However, as with my recent episode celebrating the artistry of Pierre Bernac apart from his performances of the music of Francis Poulenc, in today’s episode, there is not a note of Britten’s music to be heard. There is no question that Britten was a formative figure in Pears’ artistic development, but throughout their lives together, he performed a wide range of music, from Pérotin to Lutosławski as an independent and enormously artist. In this episode, I offer selections by Webern, Handel, Copland, Couperin, Stravinsky, Dowland, Tippett, Mozart, Holst, Bach, Copland, Berkeley, Schubert, Walton, Schütz, Debussy, Handel, Nordheim, Schumann, and David Bedford, among others, to offer a surprising portrait of this fascinating singer. Even if you have not (yet) acquired a taste for this (sometimes) controversial singer, I urge you to give it a listen, for not only does it present Pears in all his varieties, it also highlights his musical partnerships with Joan Sutherland, Sviatoslav Richter, Murray Perahia, Dennis Brain, Viola Tunnard, George Malcolm, Martha Mödl, Gré Brouwenstijn, Imogen Holst, and Noel Mewton-Wood (as well as a few clips with with his life-partner Britten at the piano).
RECORDINGS HEARD IN THIS EPISODE
George Frideric Handel, John Gay [after Ovid, John Dryden]: Happy we! (Acis and Galatea, HWV 55). Peter Pears, Joan Sutherland, Adrian Boult, Philomusica of London [1961]
John Dowland: Say, Love, if ever thou didst find (The Third and Last Booke of Songs and Airs). Peter Pears, Julian Bream [live 1965]
William Walton, anonymous text: O stay, sweet love (Anon In Love). Peter Pears, Julian Bream [BBC recording 12.IX.1961]
Mátyás Seiber, anonymous poet: Tears (To Poetry, No. 3). Peter Pears, Noel Mewton-Wood [BBC 25.IX.1953]
William Busch, Thomas Campion: Come, o come, my life’s delight. Peter Pears, Viola Tunnard [1955]
Aaron Copland, traditional text: The Dodger (Old American Songs, Set One, No. 3). Peter Pears, Benjamin Britten [1950]
Witold Lutosławski, Jean-François Chabrun: Troisième Tapisserie (Paroles tissées). Peter Pears, Witold Lutosławski, London Sinfonietta [1972]
Johann Sebastian Bach: Mich kann kein Zweifel stören (Es ist euch gut, dass ich hingehe, BWV 108). Peter Pears, Karl Richter, Mitglieder des Orchesters der Münchener Staatsoper [1960]
Heinrich Schütz: Und siehe, Zweene aus ihnen gingen (Historia der Auferstehung Jesu Christ, SWV 50). Peter Pears, Robert Tear, John Shirley-Quirk, Ian Partridge, Roger Norrington, Charles Spinks, Elizabethan Consort of Viols [1970]
François Couperin: O Jesu dulcissime (Audite omnes et expanescite). Peter Pears, George Malcolm, Emanuel Hurwitz, Nona Liddell, Terence Weil [1961]
George Frideric Handel, Thomas Morell: Waft her, angels, through the skies (Jephtha). Peter Pears, unknown performing forces [1970s]
Bernard Van Dieren, William Shakespeare: Take, o take those lips away. Peter Pears, Viola Tunnard [1955]
Robert Schumann, William Shakespeare [translated by August von Schlegel, Ludwig Tieck]: Schlußlied des Narren, Op. 127/5. Peter Pears, Murray Perahia [live Aldeburgh 1974]
Claude Debussy, Paul Verlaine: Les Ingénus (Fêtes Galantes II, FL 114/1). Peter Pears, Sviatoslav Richter [live Aldeburgh 20.VI.1967]
Alan Bush, William Blake: From Selections from Milton (Voices of the Prophets, No. 3). Peter Pears, Noel Mewton-Wood [BBC 25.IX.53]
Anton Webern, August Strindberg: Schien mir’s, als ich sah die Sonne (Vier Lieder, Op. 12/2). Peter Pears, Benjamin Britten [BBC 18.VI.1957]
Arne Nordheim, Ezra Pound: Doria. Peter Pears, Per Dreier, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra [1979]
David Bedford, Arthur C. Clarke: The child playing among the rock pools (Tentacles of the Dark Nebula). Peter Pears, David Bedford, London Sinfonietta [1972]
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Johann Andreas Schachtner: O selige Wonne (Zaide). Peter Pears, Gré Brouwenstijn, Owen Brannigan, Harry Blech, London Mozart Players [live London 14.VII.1952]
Igor Stravinsky, Jean Cocteau: Pavesco subito Jocasta (Oedipus Rex). Peter Pears, Martha Mödl, Igor Stravinsky, Kölner Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester, Männerchöre des NWDR [live Köln 08.X.1951]
William Walton, Christopher Hassall: Forgive me… Passing through the city (Troilus and Cressida). Peter Pears, Richard Lewis, Malcolm Sargent, Orchestra of the Royal Opera House Covent Garden [world premiere 03.XII.1954]
Lennox Berkeley, Eric Crozier: Take thou this kiss (Ruth). Peter Pears, Alfreda Hodgson, Steuart Bedford, BBC Northern Symphony Orchestra and Singers [BBC 18.VIII.1968]
Gustav Holst, libretto after the Mahābhārata: Like a spectre in the forest (Sāvitri). Peter Pears, Arda Mandikian, Charles Mackerras, English Opera Group [live Aldeburgh VI.1956]
Franz Schubert, Ludwig Rellstab: Auf dem Strom, D 943. Peter Pears, Dennis Brain, Noel Mewton-Wood [BBC 28.I.1953]
Michael Tippett, Sydney Keyes: Remember your lovers (The Heart’s Assurance, No. 5). Peter Pears, Noel Mewton-Wood [1953]
