Britten Thematic Catalogue

Beta Version

BTC1104 FANCIE

For voice and piano
Composition date: 9 May 1961
Genre: Solo vocal
Text: William Shakespeare (1564-1616)
Duration: 1'
Dedication: 'For M.H.'

Marion (Harewood) Thorpe, née Stein (b. 1926), originally a concert pianist and daughter of Erwin Stein. Married Lord Harewood in 1949 (marriage dissolved 1967).

Notes

In its original voice and piano version, this song was one of three settings of Shakespeare's text by living composers (the others were by Poulenc and Kodály) first published in Classical songs for children, ed. Marion Harewood and Ronald Duncan (London: Anthony Blond, 1964). It was revised in 1965 for unison voices (with optional divisi into three parts) and piano.

Britten set the same text much earlier as a madrigal, but the piece is missing (Where is fancy bred?, 1931).

All content copyright (C) Britten-Pears Foundation 2012 unless stated. Please note all BTC numbers are provisional at this stage.