02-27-2006, 09:03 AM
Benjamin's Britten's long lost score to W H Auden's Roman Wall Blues has been found!:
Over the heather the wet wind blows, I've lice in my tunic and a cold in my nose.
WH Auden wrote his Roman Wall Blues, about a fed-up legionary on guard duty on the northern edge of the empire, for a radio documentary broadcast live from Newcastle in 1937. Benjamin Britten, then 24, wrote the music for the programme but his score disappeared.
Now, thanks to a chance conversation on the way to church, a copy of the programme's big number - Britten's setting of Auden's bluesy verse - has turned up at the Northumberland home of a 99-year-old former employee of the Bank of England. It will go on show during this year's Aldeburgh festival and may be performed next year in the Sage Gateshead concert hall to mark the 70th anniversary of the programme and the centenary of Auden's birth.
David Ward, Monday February 27, 2006, The Guardian. For complete story see: http://www.guardian.co.uk/frontpage/sto ... 89,00.html
Auden's poem can be found at:
http://www.stephen.j.murray.btinternet.co.uk/auden.htm
Over the heather the wet wind blows, I've lice in my tunic and a cold in my nose.
WH Auden wrote his Roman Wall Blues, about a fed-up legionary on guard duty on the northern edge of the empire, for a radio documentary broadcast live from Newcastle in 1937. Benjamin Britten, then 24, wrote the music for the programme but his score disappeared.
Now, thanks to a chance conversation on the way to church, a copy of the programme's big number - Britten's setting of Auden's bluesy verse - has turned up at the Northumberland home of a 99-year-old former employee of the Bank of England. It will go on show during this year's Aldeburgh festival and may be performed next year in the Sage Gateshead concert hall to mark the 70th anniversary of the programme and the centenary of Auden's birth.
David Ward, Monday February 27, 2006, The Guardian. For complete story see: http://www.guardian.co.uk/frontpage/sto ... 89,00.html
Auden's poem can be found at:
http://www.stephen.j.murray.btinternet.co.uk/auden.htm
