Honorary Graduates
Orations and responses
Professor Thomas Adès
Oration given on 1 April 2004
Chancellor, the Senate of the University has resolved that the degree of
Doctor of the University be conferred on THOMAS JOSEPH ADÈS
Less than an hour's drive from this University, on the Suffolk coast, lies
the small town of Aldeburgh, once little more than a pretty East Anglian fishing
village. Many people here today will know it well. But Aldeburgh is now famous,
of course, for more than just its fish. For three weeks every summer, it hosts
one of Europe's most important musical events, the Aldeburgh Festival. The
festival was founded in 1948 by Benjamin Britten, arguably the greatest
twentieth-century British composer, and since Britten's death, one tradition of
the festival has been that it usually appoints a distinguished contemporary
composer as its artistic director. Thus, it would have come as no surprise when,
five years ago, Thomas Adès was appointed to that position, were it not for one
thing. When his appointment was announced in 1999, the new artistic director of
the Aldeburgh Festival was then only 28 years old.
By that date, many critics had already pointed to Adès's precocious – and
prodigious – talents. (By the time he took up his position at Aldeburgh,
incidentally, he already held the post of Benjamin Britten Professor at the
Royal Academy of Music in London.) And several writers had starting comparing
him to Britten – not without reason; Britten, too, established for himself a
national and indeed international reputation as a composer very early in his
career. But there is one important difference. While barely out of his teens,
Britten longed to go to Austria to study with Alban Berg, then regarded as one
of the most exciting avant-garde composers in Europe. But he was not allowed to
go. Berg, for some unknown reason, was regarded as potentially ‘unsound', even
dangerous. In the end, not only Britten's teachers but even his mother, it
seems, put their collective feet down. Adès, by contrast, as a very young man
was inspired by the works of Hungarian composer György Kurtag, whom he met, not
quite by chance, at a summer school at Szombathely in Hungary. Unlike Britten,
Adès was positively encouraged by his liberal-minded parents to study with
Kurtag and, since then, has been a dedicated advocate of his music. Moreover, he
has promoted Kurtag, as well as other, sometimes neglected 20th-century
composers like the American Conlon Nancarrow, not only through his own
performances as pianist and conductor but also through his innovative
programming. As artistic director at Aldeburgh, he has had an unparalleled
opportunity to open the eyes and ears of audiences to a wealth of unfamiliar
experiences; and indeed, he has brought a breadth and richness to the Festival's
programmes unsurpassed since the early years of Britten's own directorship.
At this point, you might perhaps expect me to say: "but today, it is really
Adès the composer whom we are honouring"; but I don't intend to say quite that.
Talk to any gathering of serious and dedicated musicians and, even if they agree
on nothing else, they will agree on one thing: that music is indivisible.
Performing, composing, teaching, coaching singers, conducting, directing a major
festival – they are all just different aspects of the same thing. Adès's
reputation as a pianist is every bit as formidable as his reputation as a
composer, as was the case with Britten; and his skills as a conductor are
greatly admired by orchestral players, just as Britten's were. As the
Guardian newspaper recently pointed out, opera orchestras don't have to stay
behind at the end of a performance to applaud the conductor when he sets foot on
stage – and, quite often, they don't. But they certainly stayed to cheer Thomas
Adès when, after the premiere of his new opera The Tempest at Covent
Garden barely six weeks ago, he took his bow as both composer and conductor: a
triumph for English opera that the same newspaper likened to the England World
Cup rugby win. (Well, that's journalism for you.) But, no matter whether the
simile is appropriate or not, that premiere was, quite clearly, an extraordinary
moment in British musical life. The Guardian's leader column – notice
that, the leader column, not an article buried somewhere in the arts pages of
the newspaper – talked of a kind of music that simply "reaches out to the
audience's heart and head"; while music critic Andrew Clements described some of
the passages of orchestral writing as just "sheerly, heart-stoppingly
beautiful". And in general, reviews of the Tempest, and of the audience's
reactions, made it plain that this was a contemporary opera that had achieved
immediate, and genuine, popular success.
The recent premiere of the Tempest might, therefore, justifiably be
regarded as something of a national triumph. But equally significant, it seems
to me, is another musical event that took place not in London but in Berlin –
significant, because it really does reflect the extent of Thomas Adès's
world-wide reputation. When, a year or so ago, Sir Simon Rattle took up his
baton for the first time as music director of the Berlin Philharmonic, by far
the longest work on that evening's programme was a symphony by Gustav Mahler.
(Rattle had, of course, conducted the Berlin orchestra on many previous
occasions, including in Mahler, but this was his first official concert as their
newly appointed music director). But the concert did not begin with Mahler; the
first work on the programme was Thomas Adès's Asyla. In other
words, the very first notes to sound forth in the great hall of the Berlin
Philharmonic under Rattle's musical directorship were the work of a contemporary
(and still young) British composer: these notes, in fact … [music example]
Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, ladies and gentlemen: the award of an honorary
degree has several functions. It is, of course, intended primarily to honour –
and, I hope, give pleasure to – the person who receives it. That, certainly, is
the spirit in which this degree is offered today. It is, moreover, a way of
saying "thank you", although surely, since there can be little doubt that many
of Thomas Adès's creative achievements are still to come, we must to some extent
be saying "thank you" in eager anticipation. But we should also remember, and
acknowledge, that the acceptance of such an award at the same time
honours the institution that offers it. We are indeed honoured, Thomas, that you
should have accepted, and grateful to you, not only for the many wonderful
musical experiences you have given us, but also for the fact that you were
willing to be with us today.
Chancellor, I present to you THOMAS JOSEPH ADÈS
Orator: Professor Peter Vergo