Brussels Sprouts and Christmas Carols

Ahead of the looming excitement of Christmas day we asked our Musically Gifted composers what they're most looking forward to and what they really think about Brussels sprouts... 

All of these composers will have new works premiered by Britten Sinfonia this season, find out how you can get involved on the Musically Gifted website. Watch our Christmas video here. 

Ben Comeau

What’s your favourite Christmas song and why?

Unashamedly highbrow response!  Any of Bach’s Christmas music, especially O Jesulein süß (O Little One Sweet). Poulenc’s four Christmas motets. Messiaen’s Dieu Parmi Nous for organ.

The one you really can’t stand?

I’m usually very eclectic in my tastes, but Christmas really brings out the very worst in pop music. The tropes and cheap tinsel of Christmas hits are so depressing. I could probably enjoy Slade’s Merry Christmas Everybody if it were an obscurity, but the Pavlovian response when it starts playing in a club brings out a rare misanthropic streak in me...

Favourite thing about Christmas?

Obviously (some of) the music. And if it ever snows, going out on a long walk.

Your Christmas pet hate?

The pop music...

Brussels sprouts, yes or no?

YES and then some! I could eat barrels of them.

Tom Coult

What’s your favourite Christmas song and why?

12 Days of Christmas – hands down the most structurally innovative of all Christmas songs. It’s a cumulative form with an irregular metre and irregular, additive phrase structure – introductory lines and the ‘partridge in a pear tree’ segment in 4/4, then incrementally adding 3/4 bars, excepting the 5th phrase (‘five gold rings’) which is in 4/4, after which point the melody of the following three phrases alters for each subsequent verse. I’ve done a diagram of the phrases in each verse – italics denote the changed melody after ‘five gold rings’:

AB - ACB - ADCB - AEDCB - AFEDCB - AGFEDCB - AHGFEDCB - AIHGFEDCB - AJIHGFEDCB - AKJIHGFEDCB - ALKJIHGFEDCB - AMLKJIHGFEDCB

The one you really can’t stand?

The Holly and the Ivy. The word setting is awful – all the lines seem to have different numbers of syllables that have to fit into the same tune, and accents fall on strange words. 'Of all the trees that are in the wood’ – very odd.

Favourite thing about Christmas?

The Father Ted Christmas special.

Your Christmas pet hate?

People moaning about Christmas decorations going up in October and November.

Brussels sprouts, yes or no?

No. Yes? Dunno. Was Pierre Boulez not available for this Q&A?

Iain Farrington

What’s your favourite Christmas song and why?

My favourite ‘original’ Christmas work is Britten's Ceremony of Carols: fresh, brilliant, and moving. To think it was composed on board a ship on the Atlantic during World War II makes it even more remarkable. Of the ‘traditional’ carols, I love the original 16th Century Coventry Carol which has such tension to it, unsettling major/minor shifts and uneven bar lengths. Also The First Nowell, especially as arranged by Elgar at the end of his The Starlight Express (nothing to do with Lloyd Webber!)

The one you really can’t stand?

Any of the contemporary pieces that are loaded with saccharine sentimentality, cloying harmony and butter-wouldn’t-melt-in-your-mouth naivety. Like having to eat an extra-large Christmas pudding in one go.

Favourite thing about Christmas?

The positive atmosphere, lights, colour, food and drink; all the best things to get through the darkness of winter.

Christmas pet hate?

Dewy-eyed and cynical TV adverts (Sainsbury’s, this year).

Brussels sprouts, yes or no?

Definitely, and all year round too. However, will we have to change the name if we leave the EU?

Joey Roukens

What’s your favourite Christmas song and why?

Although I don’t have any real favourites, I prefer the ‘classic’ Christian hymns and carols such as Adeste Fideles, Silent Night and Hark the Herald Angels Sing, partly because of their sentimental value – I used to sing these as a child at school and with my mother, and partly because they simply have lovely melodies that are both tender and solemn.

The one you really can’t stand?

Most Christmas pop songs I can’t stand, but if I had to pick one, it would be Last Christmas (by Wham!) which I find the most aggravating Christmas song ever penned. All I want for Christmas is you (Mariah Carey) and Simply having a wonderful Xmas time (Paul McCartney) are pretty terrible too. The thing is, even the great Christmas songs become vexatious just by maddening repetition during the Christmas season.

Favourite thing about Christmas?

Christmas dinner with family!

Your Christmas pet hate?

See question #2 – hellish repetition of the same annoying songs, all the crappy programs and movies on TV, massive consumerism.

Brussels sprouts, yes or no?

Yes!

Nico Muhly

What’s your favourite Christmas song and why?

Well, let’s back up and say that the all-time best is O Come, O Come Emmanuel, because there is nothing more joyful than moving from that minor mode to the expectant major on the word, “Rejoice!"

The one thing you can’t stand?

Everybody losing their mind about Christmas before Advent starts. 

Favourite thing about Christmas?

Having the entire city to myself. Everybody peaces out and I can walk up and down the middle of the street.

Christmas pet hate?

I actually have no idea what this could possibly mean. Do you mean is there a thing my dog hates at Christmas?

Brussels sprouts, yes or no?

Firmly yes! You just have to handle them right. Sometimes raw is the way forward, indeed, and other times, the opposite.  

Meet Kitty Whately - mezzo-soprano

(c) Natalie Watts

Kitty Whately will be the mezzo-soprano soloist in an upcoming performance of Bach's Magnificat (6 December 2014) in London's Barbican Hall. She will also be joining Britten Sinfonia abroad in the new year as one of the soloists in an Amsterdam performance of Haydn's Nelson Mass (February 2015).

Find out more about Kitty in this blog post as she reveals her biggest fears, guiltiest pleasures and what animal she would be...


What has been the highlight of your career so far?

That's a tough one. I have been so lucky over the past few years to get to work with some fantastic people in beautiful places. I think I'd say working in the Aix en Pravence festival last summer. It was a newly commissioned opera by Vasco Mendonça, for just two singers. It was directed by Katie Mitchell, and I found her rehearsal process fascinating. It was a great part, and I got on so well with everyone involved. We were rehearsing in a beautiful old chateau in sunny provence and the whole period was fab. 

When are you happiest?

In my favourite place on earth, Aldeburgh, with my fiance Anthony and my 8 year old daughter, Ivy. Anthony and I are getting married there next year. 

What is your greatest fear?

Losing the people I love. 

What is your earliest musical memory?

Singing along to Paul Simon's Graceland, Katheryn Tickell the Northumbrian piper, and Salif Keïtar, an Afro-pop singer/songwriter from Mali and favourite of my dad's, on long car trips with my family. 

Which living person do you most admire, and why?

Oh that's too hard. I'll say my family- I admire my fiance for his kindness and his calm, positive attitude to life, I admire my dad for his hard work ethic, and his well-earned reputation for being an incredibly lovely collegue and warm person, and my mum for her intellegence, her wit, and selflessness and generosity towards supporting her family, especially me. 

What was your most embarrassing moment?

I can't think of any really. I must wipe them. I try to laugh at myself as often as possible so perhaps that helps me to not feel embarrassment? No, I really do. I just can't remember any. 

What is your most treasured possession?

My daughter. Can I say that? If not, my pillow. 

What would your super power be?

Hmm, if I could choose one? I would choose the power to click my fingers and arrive somewhere without travelling. 

If you were an animal what would you be?

A pot-bellied pig. I love food, and I already have the pot belly. 

What is your most unappealing habit?

Licking my plate after a delicious meal. I try not to do it in public, but my family have to put up with it at home. Waste not - want not. 

What is your favourite book?

How To Be a Woman by Caitlin Moran.

What is your guiltiest pleasure?

Watching X Factor.

Who would you invite to your dream dinner party?

Jamie Oliver (to cook), Billy Connolly, Stephen Fry, Caitlin Moran, Jo Brand and Phil and Fern (Schofield and Cotton). 

If you could go back in time, where would you go?

To the era of Jane Austin. I love all that. I'd only want to visit though. I wouldn't want to stay there for ever.  

How do you relax away from the concert platform?

Cooking or watching cookery programmes with my fiance, and watching movies and eating popcorn with my daughter. 

What do you consider your greatest achievement?

My daughter. Honestly, I know that's a cliche. But I really do. So often I look at her and I think "I made a human being in my body, and kept her alive! And she can walk and talk and everything!!"

What is the most important lesson life has taught you?

Happiness is a transitional state. You don't arrive at 'happiness' and live happily ever after. It comes and goes. 

In a nutshell, what is your philosophy?
Enjoy the happy moments while they last, and keep strong in the unhappy ones. Remember they will pass. 

Bach's Magnificat featuring Kitty Whately will be performed on Saturday 6 December 2014. More information can be found on our website.