| Canticle I: My beloved is mine and I am his | |
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| Vocal composition byBenjamin Britten | |
| Opus | 40 |
| Related | Canticles |
| Occasion | Memorial concert forDick Sheppard |
| Text | byFrancis Quarles |
| Language | English |
| Performed | 1 November 1947 (1947-11-01) |
| Duration | 7 min |
| Scoring | |
Canticle I: My beloved is mine and I am his,Op. 40, is a composition for high voice and piano byBenjamin Britten, the first part of his series of fiveCanticles. It was composed for a memorial concert. The text is taken fromFrancis Quarles's poetry based on the biblicalSong of Songs. It was published byBoosey & Hawkes under the shorter titleCanticle I: My beloved is mine.
Britten composed his fiveCanticles over an extended period of almost 30 years, between 1947 and 1975.[1] They have in common to be written for voices, all including a tenor withPeter Pears in mind, as a result of "the personal and creative relationship between Britten and his most important muse".[2] All are set to religious but not biblical texts. The first such work was possibly titledCanticle because it set a paraphrase of verses from theSong of Songs, sometimes referred to as the Canticles. In the works, Britten followed the model ofPurcell'sDivine Hymns, and wrote music that can be seen as miniaturecantatas, and assong cycles.[1]
Canticle I: My beloved is mine and I am his was written in 1947 for a memorial concert forDick Sheppard,[1] who had beenvicar atSt Martin-in-the-Fields[3] and had founded thePeace Pledge Union.[4] The text was taken fromA Divine Rapture byFrancis Quarles, which is based on the biblicalSong of Songs.[3][1] Britten setMy beloved is mine and I am his for high voice and piano.[1]
On 1 November 1947, Pears and Britten performed the world premiere of the Canticle at theMethodist Central Hall, Westminster, as part of a memorial concert for Sheppard[4] It was published byBoosey & Hawkes for high voice and piano. The duration is given as 7 minutes.[5][6] Peter Pears wrote in 1952 that he regarded the Canticle as "Britten's finest piece of vocal music to date".[1]
In 2017, the Canticle was featured in a Queer Talk exhibition, as "a work which bravely expresses same-sex love at a time when it was very dangerous to do so."[4]
The text for Canticle I was taken fromA Divine Rapture by Quarles, a paraphrase of sections from theSong of Songs from the Old Testament. It arrives several times at the refrain line "I my best beloved’s am – so he is mine".[4] As already the original biblical poetry, it is "full of beautiful, sensuous imagery".[4]
The piano writing evokes images like waves at a shore,[7] paired with "expressive and sometimes highly melismatic freedom of vocal writing".[1] Composed for Britten's partner Peter Pears, and performed by the two men in the first performance, it carries further meaning beyond an allegory of love of God and the Soul.[4][8] Britten's biographerDavid Matthews described it as one of the composer's most serene works, which "ends in a mood of untroubled happiness that would soon become rare in Britten's music".[9]
Canticle I was performed, together with the otherCanticles, in a concert atWigmore Hall in London in 2012 byMark Padmore and pianistJulius Drake.[7] It was performed at theProms in Britten's centenary year 2013, byJames Gilchrist and pianistImogen Cooper.[10]
Canticle I was recorded in 1985 in a collection of vocal music by Britten, sung byAnthony Rolfe Johnson with pianistGraham Johnson.[11] It was recorded, in a collection of all five canticles, byNaxos Records in 2005,Canticle I with tenorPhilip Langridge and pianistSteuart Bedford.[2][8] The five canticles were recorded again in 2012, with musicians around tenorBen Johnson.[12]
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