PREFATORY NOTE In childhood Britten was not only an accomplished pianist and prolific composer, but also an enthusiastic viola player. He received his earliest viola lessons from Audrey Alston, a friend of his mother’s, and a member of the Norwich String Quartet. She was also a friend of the composer Frank Bridge (1879-1941) and it was Mrs Alston who effected the introduction that led to Bridge accepting the thirteen-year-old Britten as a composition pupil. Britten continued to play the viola throughout his school and College days, often participating in chamber music at ‘home in Lowestoft or with Bridge (who was himself a distinguished violist) and his circle, and the viola features prominently in many of his youthful compositions, in sonatas, occasional pieces and chamber music. ‘One of the most accomplished of Britten’s juvenile chamber pieces is his Quartettino dating from the first months of 1930, in which he explores aspects of his teacher's progressive late style, an idiom whose harmonic vocabulary and obsessive organic development reveal an acute awareness of musical trends emanating from Europe, in particular from the Vienna of Schoenberg and Berg. Reflection for viola and piano, ‘composed on 11 April 1930, continues the stylistic adventurousness of Quartettino in ‘a manner less extreme than the quartet, yet in which the palpable influence of Bridge (eg. from his remarkable 1929 Piano Trio, a work Britten much admired) and the ‘Second Viernnese School remain clearly discernable. It comes as no surprise, then, to read in Britten's diary entry for 14 April, three days after writing Reflection: Go in morning, after trying over the Vla piece [Reflection] with Basil [Reeve, a pianist friend]. . . to get my Schonberg (6 Short Pieces [Op. 19]) ordered on Friday... Iam getting very fond of Schénberg, especially with study. ‘The work was revised on 1 June 1930 in time for it to be submitted, alongside the radical Quartettino and other smaller pieces, for a composition scholarship at the Royal College of Music. It was not performed, however, until November 1995 when it was revived as part of a BBC Radio 3 retrospective of Britten's juvenilia, in a performance given by Philip Dukes (viola) and Sophia Rahman (piano). The first concert performance was given on 24 October 1996, in the Kleine Zaal of the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam, as part of the Concertgebouw’s Shostakovich-Britten series, by Nobuko Imai (viola) and Ellen Corver (piano). ‘The title Reflection replaces Britten's unduly prosaic ttle for the work ‘Piece’. This first publication has been prepared from the manuscript fair copy in the Britten-Pears Library, Aldeburgh. The music needed little editorial attention, but the composer's sometimes idiosyncratic fingering for the viola, retained in the piano score, has been omitted from the separate viola part. PHILIP REED COLIN MATTHEWSREFLECTION for viola and piano BENJAMIN BRITTEN Andante ma con moto (1913-1976) Viola Piano el (sul A) poco crese. GORNO MUSIC LIBRARY Music © 1997 by The Britten Estate PREVErSity of Cinotnnatt ‘This music is copyright, Photocopying is illegal Al publishing rights exercised worldwide by Faber Music Ltd, London3 poco rall. a tempo di pid animato o a aS il basso cantabile e marcato 1 Tih ‘mf cantabile senate mf2 ———— a (sul A) a 2 _———_s a ——_3 1 sey ee a ‘cantabile ¢ marcato se Se bale Ba a ‘marcato3pp morendo una corda a Ped June Ist 1930