Page 96 - Media Coverage Book - 75th Aldeburgh Festival 2024

Britten, Imogen Holst and Pears, early 1950s
(Photo: Britten Pears Arts)

Without doubt, Britten was a pioneering figure in the world of classical music and long before arts
organisations ever thought of engaging in education and supporting young artists, Britten, along with
Pears, found a school honoured by their names in 1972 known today as the Britten-Pears Young
Artist Programme which allows students to participate in masterclasses under the direction of
renowned instructors and to perform on stage in festival concerts with world-class performers and
conductors.

And always striving for the best, Britten and Pears brought to the Suffolk coast a host of international
stars including such world-renowned figures as the German lyric baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau,
the American violinist/conductor Yehudi Menuhin, who, incidentally, spent most of his performing
career in Britain, the Russian pianist Sviatoslav Richter and the Russian cellist Mstislav (Slava)
Rostropovich as well as the likes of Kathleen Ferrier, Dennis Brain, Clifford Curzon and the Amadeus
String Quartet.

A coterie of emerging talent made their way to Suffolk, too, that included Swedish soprano Elisabeth
Söderström, the American pianist Murray Perahia and the English-born virtuoso classical
guitarist/lutenist Julian Bream while the inaugural festival of 1948 witnessed a staging of Britten’s
opera Albert Herring at the Jubilee Hall and the first performance of his cantata Saint Nicolas at the
Parish Church with a trio of lectures delivered by E.M. Forster on George Crabbe, Tyrone Guthrie on
theatre and Sir Kenneth Clark on East Anglian painters.

Following the deaths of Britten and Pears the artistic direction fell to a coterie of musicians who knew
both men well including conductors Philip Ledger and Steuart Bedford and composers Colin
Matthews and Oliver Knussen.

However, a big event in 2013 (Britten’s centenary year) centred on Peter Grimes which was
miraculously and successfully staged on Aldeburgh beach with the festival then under the direction of