BRITTEN Billy Budd (1960) - PACO236

Fanfare — Dominic Hartley
Issue 50:2 (Nov/Dec 2026) · Read the original review

For lovers of Britten opera, this new release from Pristine is an event. It’s the first recording of the two-act version of Billy Budd. But the broadcast it’s taken from was also the catalyst for that version, which has been the form in which the opera has been seen and heard since. There’s real historical significance here.

Some context. The 1951 premiere of Budd at Covent Garden consisted of four acts separated by three intervals. It was positively received. But for a work whose tension ratchets up moment by moment, the loss of dramatic momentum between acts understandably bothered Britten. He disliked much of what he saw of the German premiere of the work in Wiesbaden in March the next year but he did like the fact that the first two and last two acts were presented together with only a single interval in the middle. A month later he tried the same thing at a Covent Garden performance, convinced that the work’s intensity would be “quite enormously increased.”

It wasn’t, however, until 1959, when the BBC’s Third Programme proposed to Britten a revival of the work for a radio broadcast, that the composer gave thought to how to formalize the two-act experiment of earlier in the decade. Acts III and IV were relatively easily fused. More work was needed on the ending of act I to ensure dramatic congruence with act II, and Britten worked with the original librettists E. M. Forster and Eric Crozier to come up with a scenario that would lead naturally into the Cabin Scene at the start of act II. Britten wanted “a scene about Vere, but not with him.” The result—cutting the original “Muster” scene, replacing it with one where “Starry Vere” is discussed almost as a legend, and then leading us straight to the man himself alone with his Plutarch—is an inspired piece of dramaturgy. This is the version that the BBC recorded on 8 November 1960 and broadcast five days later. Miraculously, we can all now hear it.

Let me say at this stage that I have tried very hard not to let my excitement get the better of me when listening to this, but in two important ways, I prefer this recording to the one Britten recorded for Decca in 1967. First, the sheer tension and dramatic momentum Britten achieves with the BBC forces is extraordinary. I don’t know that I have ever heard Britten the conductor as possessed and driven as he is here. Second, the three principals sing and act even more convincingly than in 1967. Two are the same, of course, but both Peter Pears as Vere and Michael Langdon as Claggart are in slightly better voice in 1960 and project a positively febrile sense of stress, several notches above that found later in the decade. Joseph Ward’s Billy is a revelation. Twenty-eight at the time of the recording, he’s utterly convincing and makes Peter Glossop in 1967 sound markedly “mature” for the part. The great Peter Heyworth, writing after the broadcast described “a score stripped for action.” My goodness, how well Britten and his forces leaped at the opportunity the revisions permitted.

I would never, ever want to be without the Decca recording, of course, but it’s a surprise and delight to discover how good this “newcomer” is. The venue for the recording was the BBC Camden Theatre—a Victorian venue taken over by the BBC after the Second World War—and the venue’s excellent natural acoustics shine through here. Andrew Rose has again used Pristine’s Ambient Stereo XR to excellent effect on what I assume was a mono off-air recording. I’ll say again: this release is an event. Anyone with an interest in Britten’s music has to hear it. Dominic Hartley