A chance to stay warm and dry at Aldeburgh

A chance to stay warm and dry at Aldeburgh

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norman lebrecht

June 08, 2020

In 2013, the June festival staged Peter Grimes on the very Aldeburgh beach where George Crabbe conceived the terrifying poem of an outcast fisherman. I was fortunate in being stricken by flu – remember flu?- so I cancelled at the last moment.

Blankets were provided for those who attended. Some are still trying to get warm.

Instead of a festival this year, Aldeburgh will post on the BBC iPlayer the full video of that frigid opera. You can watch it from your sofa with a cuppa tea and a currant bun.

Also online and on-air:

– Opening Night broadcast of Britten on Camera on BBC Four followed by Struan Leslie’s Illuminations
– a staging including circus performers of Britten’s Les Illuminations – seen for the first time on Britten
Pears Arts’ YouTube Channel
• Peter Grimes on Aldeburgh Beach will be available on BBC iPlayer later this month
• Create your own Aldeburgh Musicircus experience online
• BBC Radio 3 to broadcast six archive performances from Aldeburgh Festival between 19 – 26 June

Comments

  • Jan Kaznowski says:

    Brilliant. They should dig out any Rostropovich and Richter tapes they have from the early days

  • Sean says:

    It is the MOST remarkable work, deeply moving and hugely communicative! Not frigid Norman, surely, and I would have been delighted to have had the opportunity to see such a staging, wondrous strange! I don’t like its central character, but the humanity is extraordinary in the midst of such grim reality. To each his own however.

  • V.Lind says:

    Wish I could see it, but iPlayer is not available abroad. Hope they loosen the strings at some point.

  • Eduardo Benarroch says:

    Please also include some of Heather Harper’s many performances with Britten.

  • Bostin'Symph says:

    Hurrah for the BBC! I’m quick to knock ’em, but they can come up trump’s (the good kind) when they want to! (Hurrah for Aldeburgh too!)

  • Whimbrel says:

    I was there, sitting in the audience on the shingle beach for the first performance of this truly remarkable production. I was perfectly warm and dry and saw no one being offered blankets. The wind blew, a Spitfire flew overhead, the evening light faded, the sea darkened and the tragedy unfolded. An unforgettable production of a deeply emotional opera.

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