page_title: Michael Tippett
section_title: A Child of Our Time
hierarchical_section_title: Michael Tippett / Life / Towards maturity / A Child of Our Time
caption_attribution_description: For documentary purposes the German Federal Archive often retained the original image captions, which may be erroneous, biased, obsolete or politically extreme. This description has been identified as biased or incorrect: NS-PropagandaBildtelegramm aus Paris: Das ist der jüdische Revolver-Attentäter Herschel Seibel Grynszpan! Unser (telegrafisch übermitteltes) Bild aus Paris zeigt den jüdisch polnischen Staatsangehörigen Herschel Seibel Grynszpan, der am Montagvormittag in den Räumen der Deutschen Botschaft in Paris einen Mordversuch an Legationssekretär vom Rath unternommen hatte, nach seinen Verhaftung auf dem Polizeikommissariat. Dort hatte der Verbrecher die Stirn, zu erklären, dass er mit den beiden Revolverschüssen auf Legationssekretär vom Rath seine jüdischen Rassegenossen rächen wollte. 7.11.1938 14685-38
context_page_description: Sir Michael Kemp Tippett OM CH CBE was an English composer who rose to prominence during and immediately after the Second World War. In his lifetime he was sometimes ranked with his contemporary Benjamin Britten as one of the leading British composers of the 20th century. Among his best-known works are the oratorio A Child of Our Time, the orchestral Fantasia Concertante on a Theme of Corelli, and the opera The Midsummer Marriage.
  Tippett's talent developed slowly. He withdrew or destroyed his earliest compositions, and was 30 before any of his works were published. Until the mid-to-late 1950s his music was broadly lyrical in character, before changing to a more astringent and experimental style. New influences, including those of jazz and blues after his first visit to America in 1965, became increasingly evident in his compositions. While Tippett's stature with the public continued to grow, not all critics approved of these changes in style, some believing that the quality of his work suffered as a consequence. From around 1976 Tippett's late works began to reflect the works of his youth through a return to lyricism.
context_section_description: While his therapy proceeded, Tippett was searching for a theme for a major work—an opera or an oratorio—that could reflect both the contemporary turmoil in the world and his own recent catharsis. Having briefly considered the theme of the Dublin Easter Rising of 1916, he based his work on a more immediate event: the murder in Paris of a German diplomat by a 17-year-old Jewish refugee, Herschel Grynszpan. This murder triggered Kristallnacht (Crystal Night), a coordinated attack on Jews and their property throughout Nazi Germany on 9–10 November 1938. Tippett hoped that  Eliot would provide a libretto for the oratorio, and the poet showed interest. However, when Tippett presented him with a more detailed scenario, Eliot advised him to write his own text, suggesting that the poetic quality of the words might otherwise dominate the music. Tippett called the oratorio A Child of Our Time, taking the title from Ein Kind unserer Zeit, a contemporary protest novel by the Austro-Hungarian writer Ödön von Horváth. Within a three-part structure based on Handel's Messiah, Tippett took the novel step of using North American spirituals in place of the traditional chorales that punctuate oratorio texts. According to Kenneth Gloag's commentary, the spirituals provide "moments of focus and repose ... giving shape to both the musical and literary dimensions of the work". Tippett began composing the oratorio in September 1939, on the conclusion of his dream therapy and immediately after the outbreak of war.
caption: Herschel Grynszpan
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