''Winter Words'', Op. 52, is a

song cycle A song cycle (german: Liederkreis or Liederzyklus) is a group, or cycle (music), cycle, of individually complete Art song, songs designed to be performed in a sequence as a unit.Susan Youens, ''Grove online'' The songs are either for solo voice ...

for

tenor A tenor is a type of classical music, classical male singing human voice, voice whose vocal range lies between the countertenor and baritone voice types. It is the highest male chest voice type. The tenor's vocal range extends up to C5. The lo ...

and

piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...

Benjamin Britten Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten (22 November 1913 – 4 December 1976, aged 63) was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He was a central figure of 20th-century British music, with a range of works including opera, other ...

. Written in 1953, it sets eight poems by

Thomas Hardy Thomas Hardy (2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928) was an English novelist and poet. A Victorian realist in the tradition of George Eliot, he was influenced both in his novels and in his poetry by Romanticism, including the poetry of William Word ...

. The cycle is named after Hardy's last published collection, but the poems are from different parts of his collected poems. The cycle was premiered at the

Leeds Festival The Reading and Leeds Festivals are a pair of annual music festivals that take place in Reading and Leeds in England. The events take place simultaneously on the Friday, Saturday and Sunday of the August bank holiday weekend. The Reading Festiv ...

in October 1953, with

Peter Pears Sir Peter Neville Luard Pears ( ; 22 June 19103 April 1986) was an English tenor. His career was closely associated with the composer Benjamin Britten, his personal and professional partner for nearly forty years. Pears' musical career started ...

singing and Britten at the piano. It was dedicated to

John John is a common English name and surname: * John (given name) * John (surname) John may also refer to: New Testament Works * Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John * First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John * Second ...

and

Myfanwy Piper Mary ''Myfanwy'' Piper (; Welsh: ; 28 March 1911 – 18 January 1997) was a British art critic and opera librettist. Biography Mary Myfanwy Evans was born on 28 March 1911 into a Welsh family in London. Her father was a chemist in Hampstead, nor ...

-- Myfanwy Piper was the librettist of Britten's opera ''

The Turn of the Screw ''The Turn of the Screw'' is an 1898 horror novella by Henry James which first appeared in serial format in ''Collier's Weekly'' (January 27 – April 16, 1898). In October 1898, it was collected in ''The Two Magics'', published by Macmill ...

'', which was begun in 1953 and premiered the following year. A performance takes about 22 minutes. The poems are: # "At Day-Close in November" # "Midnight on the Great Western" (or, "The Journeying Boy") # "Wagtail and Baby (A Satire)" # "The Little Old Table" # "The Choirmaster's Burial" (or, "The Tenor Man's Story") # "Proud Songsters (Thrushes, Finches and Nightingales)" # "At the Railway Station, Upway" (or, "The Convict and Boy with the Violin") # "Before Life and After"

References

{{Authority control 1953 compositions Song cycles by Benjamin Britten Classical song cycles in English Musical settings of poems by Thomas Hardy