Michael Tippett: Phiosophy and MusicThe Midsummer Marriage

Michael Tippett : Philosophy and Music
The Midsummer Marriage

Michael Tippett was born in a London Nursing home on the 2nd of January 1905; but in the same year his parents moved from Eastcote to the small Suffolk village of Wethrden, not far from Stowmarket, and it was there that he spent the formative years of his boyhood.
In 1922 when he was seventeen, Tippett went with a school party to his first symphony concert. It was at the De Montfort Hall in Leicester, and the conductor was an old Stamfordian, Malcom Sargent. The program included Ravel’s Mother Goose Suite, then still quite new. This concert made an overwhelming impression. It was at that point that Tippett decided that he was going to be a composer. He then ventured to teach himself until he convinced his parents to let him go to the Royal College of Music. There he studied composition, first under Charles Wood, who made a remarkable impact on him by introducing him to Bethoven. His years at College were a great ...