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The Faber Pocket Guide to Britten [Paperback]

John Bridcut (Author)
5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)

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There is a newer edition of this item:
Essential Britten: A Pocket Guide for the Britten Centenary Essential Britten: A Pocket Guide for the Britten Centenary 4.2 out of 5 stars (4)
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Book Description

Publication Date: 4 Nov 2010 | Series: Faber Pocket Guide

John Bridcut, author of the acclaimed 'Britten's Children', will include significant fresh material which will make the book indispensable for Britten aficionados as well as for those who are discovering the composer's music for the first time. This guide is all about finding a way into Britten's music.

An outline of planned chapters:

- The Top Ten Britten pieces

- Critics' First Impressions

- Britten's Life

- Britten and Pears

- The things they said

- The Music (stage works, choral works, songs, chamber music, orchestral works)

- The Interpreters of Britten's work

- Britten as Performer

- The Impresario (English Opera Group and Aldeburgh Festival)

- Britten's Homes

- Trivial Pursuits

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Product details

  • Paperback: 400 pages
  • Publisher: Faber and Faber (4 Nov 2010)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0571237762
  • ISBN-13: 978-0571237760
  • Product Dimensions: 11.1 x 2.8 x 17.8 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 351,003 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Product Description

Review

Faber's enterprising Pocket Guide series is growing into an invaluable library ... these are perfect concert companions and will please the novice and aficionado alike. --Classical Music Magazine

Book Description

A highly approachable and readable guide to Benjamin Britten and his music.
See all Product Description
Inside This Book (Learn More)
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Great little book! 12 April 2011
By C. Gadsby
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
I have been researching Benjamin Britten's life and works for a forthcoming talk and although I already have a number of other books of my own and others borrowed from the library, this little book has proved to be a very nice addition to my collection.

There is a lighthearted approach in some of the chapters such as the ones on "The things they said about Britten" and "The things Britten said about them" and there are even several quizzes! However it also has plenty of detailed information about individual works as well as the individuals for whom Britten wrote them. There is a wealth of information about Britten's life and influences too, including a time-line. This is all approached in a quite different way from most of the other reference works I have read. It is a book that is interesting to dip into or equally enjoyable to read from cover to cover or to use as an occasional reference resource. For the newcomer to Britten's music there are chapters with suggestions of essential listening and his 'top ten' favorite works, also references to CDs, DVDs and online resources. Although I have described it as a 'little book' this is more about its physical size which is appropriate for a 'Pocket Guide' but it is actually 430 pages in length and really excellent value at the modest price I paid for it on Amazon. Highly recommended.
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5.0 out of 5 stars An outstanding guide 19 Aug 2012
By fanfareforthemakers
Format:Paperback
This is the sort of reference book you buy to dip into and end up reading from cover to cover. A quirky, idiosyncratic miscellany of fact, quotation and commentary, it is written with a deceptive lightness of touch, being firmly anchored, you soon realize, in a deep and focused knowledge and appreciation of its subject. This is a brilliant short guide, full of telling detail, to the life and work of the outstanding British composer of the mid twentieth century, and more than earns its place alongside earlier works of comparable scope, such as Michael Kennedy's Britten (1981) in Dent's Master Musicians series.
The book is divided into five parts, covering perceptions, past and present, of Britten's status as a composer; his life in outline; his artistry as a performer, principally as conductor and pianist; his influences; and taking up about half of the book, his music, which is categorised according to type, beginning with the orchestral works, reaching a climax with the operas and other stage works, and ending (like a Britten and Pears recital) with the folk-song arrangements. Pleasingly, the author permits himself to grade individual works, top-ranking compositions being accorded five stars, and he employs a special symbol to flag up what he considers to be key works in Britten's oeuvre: you may not always agree with John Bridcut's judgements, but you are bound to respect them and to be stimulated by them.
Seamus Heaney has said of the poet Norman MacCaig that 'he is poetry to me'. To many in the 1950s and 60s who followed the developing career of Benjamin Britten, then at the height of his powers, his music came to provide a similar kind of touchstone. Not the least of the achievements of John Bridcut's delightful book is to recover something of the excitement of those times, catching Britten on the wing, so to speak, when questions of the value the future would place upon his work seemed irrelevant beside the phenomenon of his extraordinary musicality.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com: 5.0 out of 5 stars  1 review
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars A must for any true Britten fan! 5 April 2012
By John D. Randolph - Published on Amazon.com
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
I thought I knew everything about Britten until I read this book. What a fun book. It doesn't have to be read sequentially but the topics covered are as diverse and the records and scores that Britten owned as well as Britten quotes, quotes about Britten and just about every other topic you can think of. A must have for any true Britten fan.
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