Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings

The Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings, Op. 31, is a song cycle written in 1943 by English composer Benjamin Britten for tenor accompanied by a solo horn and a small string orchestra. Composed during World War II at the request of the horn player Dennis Brain, it is a setting of a selection of six poems by British poets on the subject of night, including both its calm and its sinister aspects.

The prologue and epilogue which frame the songs are both performed by the horn alone, and in these movements Britten instructs the player to use only the horn's natural harmonics; this lends these short movements a distinctive character, as some harmonics sound sharp or flat to an audience accustomed to the western chromatic scale. The epilogue is to sound from afar, and to this end the final song does not include a part for the horn to allow the player to move off-stage.

The piece has become a central work in both tenor and horn repertoire. Britten's lifelong companion Peter Pears was the tenor in the first performances, and they recorded it together more than once.

On returning to England in 1943 following his stay in America, Britten caught measles so severely that he had to be hospitalised for several weeks. Here, while also working on his libretto for Peter Grimes, he composed most of the Serenade.

The first performance was given at the Wigmore Hall in London on 15 October 1943 with Peter Pears as the tenor soloist and Dennis Brain on the horn. Britten and Pears recorded the piece with Dennis Brain and the Boyd Neel Orchestra in October 1944, and again in a famous recording for Decca records in 1963, when Barry Tuckwell took the horn part and the London Symphony Orchestra accompanied.

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