The Fickle Sea: Britten and Debussy with the Concertgebouw Orchestra

Alan Gilbert

The conductor Alan Gilbert returns with a special programme through which the sea flows, with Debussy’s masterful triptych La mer as the closing work. The programme opens with the British-American Anna Clyne’s Restless Oceans, which draws a comparison between the tempestuousness of the natural world and female resilience. Benjamin Britten wrote the beautiful Serenade with its demanding horn part after he and tenor Peter Pears had left the US to sail back to their native England. The soloists here are also English: principal hornist Katy Woolley and tenor Robert Murray.

Benjamin Britten

Shortly after composing the Serenade, Britten wrote his most acclaimed opera, Peter Grimes, a dark thriller set in a fishing village closely resembling Britten’s hometown of Aldeburgh. In the instrumental sections of the opera, the unfathomable depths of the North Sea reflect the shadowy, remotest parts of the soul. At the same time, the Four Sea Interludes are a colourful and loving portrait of the many facets of the sea – like La mer, with which Claude Debussy took orchestral composition to a whole new level in 1905.