Q & A with Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conductor Alexander Shelley

The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra are releasing a new video production of Britten's Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra. We spoke to the orchestra's Principal Associate Conductor Alexander Shelley about his work on the project.

The video goes live on the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra's Facebook page on Thursday 14th August.

When did you first hear Benjamin Britten's Young Person's Guide?

I don't remember the first time I heard. It's one of those things one just remembers always being there. Me and the RPO were talking about this and we wondering what we could do that was different. We came back to the Young Person's Guide because the RPO is an iconic British orchestra, Britten is an iconic artist, and it is the iconic piece for drawing in audiences. It's a work that illuminates this organism which for a lot of people - the orchestra - is illusive and mysterious.

What do you think its lasting appeal is?

At the core of it is an idea which is very moving. He didn't just write his own piece to tell the story of an orchestra, he picked someone else's melody, another great English composer Henry Purcell. That in itself is very classical music: it's not just about invention, it's about taking something from before and turning it into something else moving forward. A reflection of the human condition. We're always looking at our families frm the past, then asking 'Who am I?' in order to move forward.

But, if anyone is looking to understand the compositional aspect of a style of classical music then this is a masterclass. Britten takes a theme and then int eh space of twenty minutes crafts a series of variations that show what its like to be a composer. It's beautiful, it's evocative, and it plays to the strengths of the individual instruments.

He could have written something tongue in cheek. He didn't. it speaks to his deep integrity. And at the end of the piece he overlays two fields in the music. One of them is quick - music that has been going on for a couple of minutes. The second is this huge slow musical edifice. It's like something rising out of the water.

Tell us about the narration you've written for this recording

The narration I've expanded on the original. I've set it - without wanting to be too on the nose - but I've set it in the context of how we are now. The orchestra is the opposite of isolation. It's about community and togetherness and listening and responding and a symbiosis of 80 people. It's like a flock of birds. We look at the flock of birds and wonder how are those birds doing that. The end for me is a clear vision of hope and togetherness - things we value through having missed them or seeing how much we rely on certain communities.

Read more about Benjamin Britten's work for young people in our 'Exploring: Britten's Young Persons Guide to the Orchestra'.

What have you been up to during lockdown?

It's been primarily a time of a very quick pivot, helping figure out how we stay in contact with our audiences. Fundamental questions about how things look when and if we come back together in the autumn. Not just in connection with COVID and whether an orchestra can perform. But I do think they're conversations which have shaken loose a number of questions within the last few months particularly around identity, and authorship and ownership of storytelling, and licence. It manifests itself in a lot of different ways in different countries.

That's been something that has been on my mind a lot and how we respond to that. There's been a lot of reading and thinking involved about not only how we come back in this more digitally and socially distanced era but also how we respond to those questions. That's how I've spent a large part of my time - not so much with music. I think this is a time to read and think and cut through the noise a bit.

Are you hopeful?

Whether one is hopeful or not depends on character not conditions. Even in disaster I think 'well this disaster is going to end'. I think for the performing arts, I think a schism like this is an opportunity. What areas can we accelerate? I have of course a degree of scepticism around virtual perforance.

There is so much about live performance that is unequivocally part of the human condition. To pretend that away is just as dangerous as putting everyone's lives at risk as exposing them to an illness. There was of course an initial reaction where we said as a collective - how do we secure ourselves and how do we save ourselves.

I think there are very important conversations which need to be had hand in had, like 'How do you weigh the balance?'

Because there are areas of our industry that are careering towards a precipice. As you career towards that precipice theres a bit of you that says I've got to figure out how I'm going to fly, and then there's aspects of what you do that are just going to drop off the edge.

There will be very interesting questions about how we want to live our lives. I'm suggesting there's a correct answer to this. Do we risk more because life isn't a binary condition about life or death, its about the life that you have when are alive.

The amount of music that has come out of lockdown has been marvellous and uplifting. But how do we do a lockdown video with so much rubato? It's only the end section that stays in time. This is the fun challenge. So I offered to write a new narration. And we figured that we'd try it out to see whether it worked and if it did we'd use it. And I think it did.

• royal philharmonic orchestra
• alexander shelley
• benjamin britten