''Hymn to St Cecilia'', Op. 27 is a

choral A choir ( ; also known as a chorale or chorus) is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform. Choirs may perform music from the classical music repertoire, which ...

piece by

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 ...

(1913–1976), a setting of a poem by

W. H. Auden Wystan Hugh Auden (; 21 February 1907 – 29 September 1973) was a British-American poet. Auden's poetry was noted for its stylistic and technical achievement, its engagement with politics, morals, love, and religion, and its variety in ...

written between 1940 and 1942. Auden's original title was "Three Songs for St. Cecilia's Day", and he later published the poem as "Anthem for St. Cecilia’s Day (for Benjamin Britten)". For a long time Britten wanted to write a piece dedicated to St Cecilia for a number of reasons. Firstly, he was born on St Cecilia's day; secondly, St Cecilia is the

patron saint A patron saint, patroness saint, patron hallow or heavenly protector is a saint who in Catholicism, Anglicanism, or Eastern Orthodoxy is regarded as the heavenly advocate of a nation, place, craft, activity, class, clan, family, or perso ...

of music; and finally, there is a long tradition in England of writing odes and songs to St Cecilia. The most famous of these are by

John Dryden '' John Dryden (; – ) was an English poet, literary critic, translator, and playwright who in 1668 was appointed England's first Poet Laureate. He is seen as dominating the literary life of Restoration England to such a point that the per ...

("A song for St. Cecilia's Day" 1687) and musical works by

Henry Purcell Henry Purcell (, rare: September 1659 – 21 November 1695) was an English composer. Purcell's style of Baroque music was uniquely English, although it incorporated Italian and French elements. Generally considered among the greatest E ...

Hubert Parry Sir Charles Hubert Hastings Parry, 1st Baronet (27 February 18487 October 1918) was an English composer, teacher and historian of music. Born in Richmond Hill in Bournemouth, Parry's first major works appeared in 1880. As a composer he is b ...

, and

George Frideric Handel George Frideric (or Frederick) Handel (; baptised , ; 23 February 1685 – 14 April 1759) was a German-British Baroque music, Baroque composer well known for his opera#Baroque era, operas, oratorios, anthems, concerto grosso, concerti grossi, ...

. Another briefer work by

Herbert Howells Herbert Norman Howells (17 October 1892 – 23 February 1983) was an English composer, organist, and teacher, most famous for his large output of Anglican church music. Life Background and early education Howells was born in Lydney, Gloucest ...

has the similar title ''A Hymn for St Cecilia'', but was written later in 1960. The first extant reference to Britten's desire to write such a work is from 1935 when Britten wrote in his diary "I’m having great difficulty in finding Latin words for a proposed Hymn to St Cecilia. Spend morning hunting." Britten first met Auden later that year, and subsequently worked with him on a number of large-scale works, including the operetta ''

Paul Bunyan Paul Bunyan is a giant lumberjack and folk hero in American and Canadian folklore. His exploits revolve around the tall tales of his superhuman labors, and he is customarily accompanied by Babe the Blue Ox. The character originated in the or ...

'' (1941). Britten asked that Auden provide him a text for his ode to St Cecilia, and Auden complied, sending the poem in sections throughout 1940, along with advice on how Britten could be a better artist. This was to be one of the last works they collaborated on. According to Britten's partner

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 ...

in 1980, "Ben was on a different track now, and he was no longer prepared to be dominated – bullied – by Wystan, whose musical feeling he was very well aware of. ...Perhaps he may have been said to have said goodbye to working with Wystan with his marvelous setting of the ''Hymn to St. Cecilia''." Britten began setting ''Hymn to St. Cecilia'' in the United States, certainly in June 1941 when a performance by the newly formed Elizabethan Singers was projected to take place in New York sometime later that year. In 1942, the midst of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, Britten and Pears decided to return home to England. The customs inspectors confiscated all of Britten's manuscripts, fearing they could be some type of

code In communications and information processing, code is a system of rules to convert information—such as a letter, word, sound, image, or gesture—into another form, sometimes shortened or secret, for communication through a communication ...

. Britten re-wrote the manuscript while aboard the MS ''Axel Johnson'', and finished it on 2 April 1942. It was written at the same time as ''

A Ceremony of Carols ''A Ceremony of Carols,'' Op. 28, is an extended choral composition for Christmas by Benjamin Britten scored for three-part treble chorus, solo voices, and harp. The text, structured in eleven movements, is taken from ''The English Galaxy of Shor ...

'', which shares the same affect. The text itself follows in the tradition of

ode An ode (from grc, ᾠδή, ōdḗ) is a type of lyric poetry. Odes are elaborately structured poems praising or glorifying an event or individual, describing nature intellectually as well as emotionally. A classic ode is structured in three majo ...

s, including an invocation to the muse: "Blessed Cecilia/Appear in visions to all musicians/Appear and inspire". Britten uses this as a refrain throughout piece, whereas it is the last portion of Auden's first section. The piece is in three sections, plus three iterations of the refrain, with slight variations, following each section. The first section is very similar to the refrain, couched in the E Phrygian scale and with the same melody. The second section is a

scherzo A scherzo (, , ; plural scherzos or scherzi), in western classical music, is a short composition – sometimes a movement from a larger work such as a symphony or a sonata. The precise definition has varied over the years, but scherzo often ref ...

with a modified

fugue In music, a fugue () is a contrapuntal compositional technique in two or more voices, built on a subject (a musical theme) that is introduced at the beginning in imitation (repetition at different pitches) and which recurs frequently in the c ...

form. The third section is more lyrical, with solos in each voice describing a different instrument, traditional in odes to St. Cecilia. The hymn was given its first radio performance in 1942.Hyperion Program Notes by Rupert Gough, 2014.
/ref>

Notes

References

* Britten, Benjamin. ''Hymn to St. Cecilia''. Op. 27. New York:

Boosey and Hawkes Boosey & Hawkes is a British music publisher purported to be the largest specialist classical music publisher in the world. Until 2003, it was also a major manufacturer of brass, string and woodwind musical instruments. Formed in 1930 throu ...

, 1942. * * Carpenter, Humphrey. ''Benjamin Britten, A Biography''. New York: C. Scribner and Sons, 1992. * * Rosamond McGuiness, Tony Trowles. "Ode (ii): Odes for St. Cecilia's Day", ''

Grove Music Online ''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' is an encyclopedic dictionary of music and musicians. Along with the German-language ''Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart'', it is one of the largest reference works on the history and theo ...

'', ed. L. Macy (accessed 10 December 2004)
grovemusic.com
(subscription access). *

External links

Hymn to St Cecilia
Britten Thematic Catalogue {{italic title 1942 compositions Choral compositions Compositions by Benjamin Britten Poetry by W. H. Auden