Seasonal Pick Britten, Benjamin. (1913–1976) Peter Grimes. An Opera In Three Acts And A Prologue Derived From The Poem Of George Crabbe Words By Montagu Slater. - Libretto - Ships Same Day [ZnBycjWg]

“Peter Grimes is widely regarded as one of the masterpieces of postwar opera, and its premiere marked a turning point in the history of British opera” (Boyden, 583). It “laid the foundation for a revival of native opera which Britten’s works have continued to dominate” (New Grove 3:293). When Joan Cross, director of the Sadler’s Wells Opera Company, heard selections from the unfinished score in 1944, she determined that Peter Grimes should be the first opera performed by the company after the end of World War II. As performed with Pears in the title role and Cross herself in the role of Ellen Orford, it was an immediate success, almost instantly hailed as a great work: to this day it is Pears’ interpretation of the title role that sets the standard by which all other performers are judged. “The music was complex and subtle and harmonically modern, not the kind that can be fully appreciated at a single hearing. But its dramatic impact was so inescapable that the audience sat spellbound… ‘It is a milestone in modern opera,’ wrote the correspondent of the New York Times” (Cross I: 142). “The opera seizes on you, possesses you, keeps you riveted to your seat during the action and keyed up during the intermissions, and drops you, purged and exhausted, at the end” (Edmund Wilson).