Benjamin Britten The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra Curriculum materials by Joanna Cortright, for Young People’s Concert performances of November and December 2002.
A profile of The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra British composer Benjamin Britten (1913-1976) created The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra. Britten began composing as a young boy, and was very good at working out musical ideas in his head. He grew up to become one of Britain’s most important composers. Queen Elizabeth II bestowed the title Lord Aldeburgh in 1976 to honor Britten for his contributions to English society. Britten wrote The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra in 1946 to accompany an educational film about the orchestra. In the years just after World War II, England was trying to rebuild after the terrible bombings of the war years. The British Ministry of Education wanted to lift people’s spirits, help them remember the beauty of music, and to experience again some of the things that make life worth living. They asked Britten to write a piece that would interest children and help them learn about music and the sounds of instruments. The music is sometimes performed with dancers portraying the featured instruments. One of Britten’s compositional techniques was to pair older, traditional English musical ideas or tunes with his 20th century compositions. He did this in The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra, taking the main theme from a composition by one of England's famous composers from the past, Henry Purcell (1658-1695). Britten borrowed the theme from the Purcell opera, The Moor's Revenge, and composed a series of variations for instruments of the orchestra. Britten created an original tune for the third section, the fugue. The whole composition is organized into three sections – the theme, the variations, and the fugue.
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