Simon Halsey on Michael Tippett’s "A Child of Our Time" (16 min.)

Michael Tippett’s A Child of Our Time has established itself since the 1940s as one of the outstanding British choral works. At the concert in the Berlin Philharmonie in April 2013, Brett Dean’s The Last Days of Socrates was paired with Tippett’s work. For the listener, it was particularly interesting to identify the similarities and differences between the oratorios. In both cases, for example, there is a sophisticated fusion of late Romanticism and experimental innovation. However, while the Tippett work mainly leaves behind an impression of warm efflorescence and fluency, the appeal of Dean’s oratorio lies in its sharp-edged, constantly surprising character. In our interval feature Simon Halsey introduces A Child of Our Time.