Peter Pears

Speaker 40:00

Hello, I'm Kirstie Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. For rights reasons we've had to shorten the music. The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen sixty nine. Desert Island Discs.

Speaker 40:29

As usual, the castaway is introduced by Roy Plumley.

Presenter0:34

This week, ladies and gentlemen.

Presenter0:35

Our castaway is a singer, the tenor Peter Pears. mister Pears, apart from professional interest, do you play records a lot for relaxation?

Presenter0:44

Um not a great deal.

Presenter0:46

But sometimes I long to hear a piece by, shall we say, Delius that I haven't heard for years and years and um either I go out and buy the record if I haven't got it or I go and look up in in my rather meagre library of of discs uh for the old piece and um I get a great deal of satisfaction then if I find it there, I enjoy it. Did you have any kind of plan in in in choosing your eight for exile?

Presenter1:14

I suppose basically it it really is nostalgic, really. After all, I'm not so young anymore and uh I've had thirty odd years of musical life and it's those uh peaks in in my career which I I would like to preserve if possible. Peaks of uh my own experience and of listening other people's to other people's music, to other people's performances. I want to be reminded of old friends, old sounds, old voices. What's the first disc you've chosen?

Presenter1:45

Well, it is a bit of Delius, in fact, which I'm very fond of, and which recalls, as nothing else does, to me, the English countryside, the scene of Suffolk or Sussex in early May, and incorporates one of the most beautiful English folk folk tunes, that is, Brig Fair by Delius.

Presenter3:08

Delius's Brig Fair, conducted by Geoffrey Toy. What's your second disc?

Presenter3:14

Well, I started singing Dowland songs almost as soon as I could sing. And th Dowland and the Madrigalists are are my great loves. And so I thought that I would take uh one disc, anyway, of the the finest lutenist we've had since Dowland's day, and one with whom I'm proud to have been associated, Julian Bream, playing uh Captain Piper's Galliard.

Presenter4:50

Juliam Bream playing Captain Piper's Galliard by John Dowland.

Presenter4:55

mister Peirce, what part of the country do you come from?

Presenter4:57

I come from Sussex. I spent the first eighteen years of my life in Sussex. Did you go to a musical school?

Presenter5:04

Yes. Um Lansing was uh musical uh when I was there uh what, thirty, forty years ago. Um I helped to start the orchestra there. What was your instrument?

Presenter5:16

Um

Presenter5:17

Well, it turned out to be, in fact, the bassoon.

Presenter5:20

Simply because nobody else really dared to try it, I think. And when you left Lancing? I had a year at Oxford as a temporary organ scholar at Harford. And then having failed to pass my past mods, I did the traditional thing of going to teach at my old prep school. Were you taking a serious interest in singing yourself at this time? I'd always sung. I sang in choirs all the time. I was encouraged to try for a scholarship at the Royal College of Music. And I didn't get the open scholarship, but I was offered an operatic exhibition. Yes. Was opera what you had in mind?

Speaker 35:54

Yeah.

Presenter5:56

No, no, I can't really say it was. It was really concert and oratorial that I was more interested in. However, I wasn't going to refuse a good offer like that. So I went to the college and did my best with cosy and unsuitable things like Rigoletto. And I took part in a memorable performance of the Village Romeo and Juliet of Delius with Sir Thomas Beach from conducting. And then I really had to earn more money. My father had retired by then. I was the youngest of seven and so on. And so I joined the BBC Chorus.

Peter Pears6:02

Uh

Speaker 36:02

Here.

Presenter6:31

And later the BBC Singers.

Presenter6:34

During my time with the BBC, I had the chance of going to America on two tours with the new English singers. And they were directed by Cuthbert Kelly, who was a very remarkable musician and a very remarkable man, and who taught me a great deal about madrigals and Elizabethan music, and indeed words and singing. You had a season at Leinbourne playing bits and pieces, too? Yes, chorus and one or two understudies, a tiny part in Macbeth, as Il Re d'Uncano, where I had to walk majestically across the stage, and as I think he was a butler in Don Pasquale, with one or two lines to utter.

Peter Pears7:16

And

Presenter7:22

What you look back on as the first important thing to happen in your career?

Presenter7:26

I think probably my first performance of the St. Matthew Passion was about the most important thing that happened then. That took place in the parish church at Brighton. And I shan't forget that the organ was, in fact, about a tone sharp. And it was directed by John Long, who was the brother of the pianist Kathleen Long. And there was no, I think, orchestra, if I remember right. But of course, the evangelist part is very extended. And I was singing very, very high indeed. Oratorio, ever since, has played a big part in your career. Yes, it has, yes. My first introduction, I suppose, to Bach was hearing an old record, which I remember quite well of the B minor Mass, which in fact is, I think, one of the records that I should like to take to my desert island with me. Mm-hmm. Which part of the Mass?

Peter Pears8:07

Put

Speaker 38:08

Yeah.

Peter Pears8:08

Is it

Presenter8:28

Well, there was the the duet, uh Etenunum, which was sung by Elizabeth Schumann, whom I adored, although I don't think this is is a very specially good performance, quite honestly, but it it's it's it captures her charm and is a very lovely piece.

Presenter9:50

Etin Unum from The Bach Mass in B minor, Elizabeth Schumann and Margaret Malfour.

Presenter9:57

A very important part of your career has been your musical partnership with Benjamin Britton. When did you first meet?

Presenter10:03

I first met Benjamin Britton in 36 or 37, at the time of the Spanish Civil War, through a mutual friend of ours, and we gave our first concert in 1938, the winter of 1938, at Cambridge in aid of the Spanish Republican funds.

Presenter10:26

Then, um, of course, uh in early 39, uh we went off to America together. Yes. This was something to do with film music, wasn't it? Yes, he'd been offered a a job in Hollywood. Um and I'm not quite sure that it uh came off, but uh certainly something of the sort came off. Uh anyway, we went and did a lot of concerts there and uh he wrote a great deal of music and so on and uh I did a good deal of studying as well. And when you came back to London you joined the Saddler's Wells Opera Company. That's right, yes. And of course you sang at the first performance of the most successful British opera of this century, at any rate, Peter Grimes. Yes, that was quite an occasion. How many times have you sung Peter Grimes now?

Presenter11:08

Um I should think I've sung it about forty eight forty to fifty times, something like that.

Speaker 311:13

Yeah.

Presenter11:13

And of course you've sung in most of the other Benjamin Britton operas, as well as Rolls at Cobben Garden in

Presenter11:20

Mozart, Smetener, Wagner, and William Walton's Troilus and Cressida. Yes, yes. Let's have your next record. Walton number four.

Presenter11:29

Well, I think I couldn't resist taking Grimes on Desert Island with me. And um the bit that I'd I'd like to play now is is the the interlude, the evening interlude, the beginning of the last act.

Presenter12:47

The Moonlight Interlude from Peter Grimes, the composer conducting the Royal Opera House Orchestra.

Presenter12:53

We've talked about your operatic career.

Presenter12:56

And your oratorio career. Um, your recital tours with Benjamin Britton. I know you've been to to Russia, to the Far East, to Latin America. Are any countries you haven't been to together?

Presenter13:08

Well, uh there probably are quite a lot, but um one of the one of the countries that we we have not yet been to is Australia.

Presenter13:15

But we shall in fact be going there in the spring of next year.

Presenter13:20

of nineteen seventy to take part in the Adelaide Festival.

Presenter13:24

Of course, you'll have a lot to do with the running of the Alderborough Festival, and this is growing into an important part of English musical life.

Presenter13:32

A lot of Benjamin Britton's music has been written for you, and you've heard most of it in the process of creation. Does he ask your opinion and and advice?

Presenter13:42

Um yes, uh to a certain extent. Um and uh if if I think that he's um making too great demands on myself and and my colleagues, well, I pipe up. It doesn't follow that he takes my advice, but um at least I don't do any harm, I think, in that way. Three or four years ago you decided to take a year off, a sabbatical year. How did you spend your time?

Presenter14:08

Uh a bit of a holiday.

Presenter14:10

In India, among other places, and also some hard work, refreshing singing lessons with a woman who I think is a very, very remarkable singing teacher, quite the most well-educated, profoundly learned singer that I've ever come across, Lucy Manin. I owe her a great deal, and I've I've proud to be a pupil of hers. Of the b very many records you've made yourself, which have pleased you most?

Presenter14:42

It's very hard to say, isn't it? I think records- making records is a terrible, terrible process. Just after you've made them, you think, well, that's the best I can do for now. I better let that go, I suppose. And then, maybe six months later, or even a year later, you hear them again and think, well, that's not half bad, actually. Not at all bad. I was stupid to be so depressed about it. And then perhaps still later, two or three years later than that, you think, how did I ever dare to put that on record at all? Will you include one of your own in your Desert Island discs?

Presenter15:18

Um yes, I think I would um if not for for the sake of my own performance, for the sake of of the music, and for the sake of my accompaniment. And that would be really the Winteriser, Schubert. Mhm. Which song should we hear?

Presenter15:38

Um I think the Imdorfer, one of the most extraordinary songs that that that Schubert ever wrote, indeed anyone, um, with a quite unique piano accompaniment uh showing the dogs growling uh in the in the distance while the unhappy man sings about his dreams.

Speaker 315:59

Nursery

Speaker 316:01

Must

Speaker 316:13

Beat on Roy.

Speaker 316:20

The sweet undoing a zor

Speaker 316:39

Uh

Presenter17:04

A song from Schubert Spinteriser with Benjamin Britton at the piano. What next?

Presenter17:10

Pm.

Presenter17:12

I think that as will be nobody on the island to talk to.

Presenter17:17

Uh I should have someone on disk to talk to me.

Presenter17:21

And one of the things that one remembers from one's early days, the most impressionable days in London when one first came to London, were the marvellous performances at Sadder's Wells by the Old Bick Company, and of course particularly the great performances of John Gilgood in things like Tempest and Lear and Roma and Juliet, Hamlet and lots more. And I thought I'd like to have in fact Gilgood reading a piece of Shakespeare.

Peter Pears17:59

Fear no more the frown of the great, Thou art past the tyrant's stroke Care no more to clothe and eat To thee the reed is as the oak.

Peter Pears18:09

The sceptre, learning, physic, must All follow this and come to dust.

Peter Pears18:17

Fear no more the lightning flash, Nor the all dreaded thunderstone Fear not slander, censure, rash Thou hast finished joy and moan.

Peter Pears18:27

All lovers young, all lovers must Consign to thee and come to dust.

Peter Pears18:36

No exorciser harm thee, nor no witchcraft charm thee.

Peter Pears18:41

Ghost unlaid forbear thee

Peter Pears18:44

Nothing ill come near thee.

Peter Pears18:48

Quiet consummation have

Peter Pears18:51

and renowned

Peter Pears18:53

be thy grave.

Presenter18:55

The Voice of Sir John Gielgood

Presenter18:58

How well do you think you could endure solitude?

Presenter19:01

I don't know. Oh, solitude, as the Purcell song goes, my sweetest choice. There are times when one thinks one could very happily endure solitude. Um.

Presenter19:11

On the other hand, I think one's can uh has only got to have it for for a few days and one begins to doubt how long one could really tackle it.

Presenter19:22

Well, I mean, one would have to get used to it, wouldn't one? One would have to to face it. One would have to simply to be philosophical about it. Could you tell him for yourself?

Presenter19:32

I'm not a very good handyman. I might be able to build some sort of shelter. I don't think I'd be an an inventor and discover all sorts of strange small objects which could be turned into into electrical equipment or something. Don't think so. Let's have your next record.

Presenter19:56

Um

Presenter19:57

Well, it would be delicious, I think, on a desert island, to hear the harpsichord sound of a Scarlatti sonata played by that marvellous player, George Malcolm, on those exquisite machines, uh Tom Gough's harpsichords.

Presenter21:17

A sonata in E major by Scarlatti, played by George Malcolm. And now we come to your last record.

Presenter21:23

I've been thinking very hard about my last record.

Presenter21:26

And I I rather think that that I decided that I would plump the record of Bismillah Khan playing his Shennai.

Presenter22:28

A piece of Indian music, Bismillah Khan playing The Shennai.

Presenter22:33

If you could take just one disk of the H you've chosen, which would it be?

Presenter22:38

Oh, very difficult. Um

Presenter22:43

I think probably something which has really been a part of me for twenty odd years. I think that would be the Grimes interlude. The Peter Grimes interlude. And one luxury to take to the island?

Presenter22:56

Um I think I know what my luxury would be. After all, we we are told uh that we spend a third of our uh lives in bed. And that would apply certainly on Desert Island. It might even be rather more than a third. So I would take my very comfortable bed with me. All right. And one book. You already have the Bible and Shakespeare.

Presenter23:19

Um here I thought I'd be practical.

Presenter23:22

There presumably will be some vegetation on the island and hopes presumably of some more. I mean, seeds might be wafted in from somewhere else. So I thought I'd get a very attractive book on tropical plants and their cultivation by a man called Bruegeman. It's got marvellous illustrations. I'm not a very good gardener, but I think that with the aid of this book I might be able to start some quite new species. Good. And thank you, Peter Piers, for letting us hear your desert island discs. Thank you for asking me. Goodbye, everyone.

Speaker 424:01

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Islandists archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.