« A musician for an occasion »: Britten, compositeur engagé

Abstract

A composer, the leader of an opera group, the director of a festival, a conductor and concert pianist, Benjamin Britten (1913-1976) was not only engaged in defending his craft but also in being an artist at the service of his community. This commitment sprang from his collaboration with the poet W.H. Auden in the mid-Thirties, whose concept of “parable art” he borrowed; and with John Grierson, the inventor of the documentary, at the GPO Film Unit. His engagement dictated personal works in which Britten expressed his peculiarity as a pacifist in war time and as a homosexual condemned to silence, as well as more official works commissioned by great institutions like the Red Cross or the UN which made of him “a musician for an occasion”. His commitment also resulted in compositions for children, performed by children, and in works that questioned the place of the artist in society.

Keywords

• pacifism
• homosexuality
• W.H. Auden
• John Grierson
• parable-art
• Britten