Rutland Boughton, the composer, was born in Aylesbury in 1878 to a grocer father and received no formal musical education until a fund was raised for him to study briefly at the Royal College of Music.
Recording & Production
This recording of The Immortal Hour was made in the church of All Saints, Tooting, London, in June 1983.
Compositional Technique
Rutland Boughton's score for The Immortal Hour uniquely blends choral utterance, Wagnerian representative themes (used un-Wagnerianly), and self-contained songs from British ballad-opera.
Notable Performances
Rutland Boughton's opera, The Immortal Hour, holds the world record for the greatest number of consecutive performances of any serious opera.
Composer's Artistic Vision
Rutland Boughton combined William Morris's Socialism and Wagnerian music drama principles to formulate theories for a specifically English type of opera he called 'Choral Drama'.
Composition History
The first Glastonbury Festival, founded by Rutland Boughton, premiered The Immortal Hour on August 26th, 1914, despite the outbreak of war and a lack of proper facilities.
Critical Reception
The Immortal Hour's immense popularity in the 1920s, with runs of 216 and 160 consecutive performances in London, led critics to dismiss it as a mere operetta.
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