BBC Proms 2016: Prom 11 - Tippett: A Child of Our Time (BBC NOW / Wigglesworth)

23rd July 2016
Royal Albert Hall, London, United Kingdom

WAGNER Die Walkure - final scene
TIPPETT A Child of Our Time

Tamara Wilson (soprano)
Susan Bickley (mezzo-soprano)
Peter Hoare (tenor)
James Creswell (bass)
BBC National Chorus of Wales
BBC National Orchestra of Wales
Mark Wigglesworth (conductor)



I first encountered Tippett's "A Child of Our Time" around the time when we had to do pre-WWII Germany history for GCSE at school. For me, at the age of 15, learning about the suffering of the Jews and the atrocity of the worst side of humanity were nothing more than academic work and storytelling because they were too distant and irrelevant. So Tippett's oratorio that is inspired by the event of "Kristallnacht" - the German retaliation on the Jews after a German diplomat was murdered by a teenage refugee abroad - hit me as a work that is merely crowd-pleasing with some cheap incorporation of Deep South American Spirituals, and the idea of "universal love" is too clichéd. The last two weeks alone, we witnessed a failed coup in Turkey, the subsequent governmental purge of educators, and numerous terrorist attacks. In preparation of tonight's Prom in this context, and that I have appreciated other Tippett works since then, I have come to look at "A Child of Our Time" with a different light. Humanity has not changed since 1940s, but neither has love - it should not have. Light and darkness form completeness and through hope and optimism we can contain evil - that is the concluding passage of his own libretto. It is clichéd because we say it too often, but does that make it less true? This is Tippett at his most accessible and lyrical, perhaps deliberately so. The BBC National Orchestra and Chorus of Wales under Mark Wigglesworth gave a solid performance, providing great buoyancy for Tippett's cascading syncopations and the choir was very well rehearsed - the Spirituals were very groovy and the accusation scenes were very punchy. The soloists were a bit uneven and the tenor was not very audible. However, the overall performance was very moving. I don't know my Wagner so I won't comment on the "Die Walküre" first half.