Michael Tippett composed his final opera New Year in the mid-80s, during a time of social unrest in a Britain fearful of multiculturalism and increased ghettoisation of its inner cities. The opera, however, is explicitly about dreams and about the desires and ambitions of two sets of characters whose destiny is for a brief period interlocked. Tippett strongly believed in the healing power of dreams, as it enables them to transcend their everyday circumstances.

Michael Tippett

Commissioned by Houston Grand Opera, Glyndebourne Festival Opera and the BBC, New Year started as a musical as the composer “wanted to communicate with a wide and unstuffy audience.” In the end, it became a melting pot of Tippet’s theatrical vision, and the result is not easy to define. As Geraint Lewis writes, “it is part musical, opera, ballet, masque, pantomime and allegory; the work is an elaborate extension and synthesis of his unique operatic world.”

Michael Tippett: New Year Suite “Prelude” (Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra; Richard Hickox, cond.)

Combining elements of fantasy and reality, the scenario features Jo Ann (lyric soprano), who is a child psychologist and who is severely uncomfortable with the real world, “as represented by her anarchic black brother Donny (baritone).” Both have been brought up as orphans by their foster mother Nana (dramatic mezzo), in the world of Somewhere Today.

Michael Tippett: New Year Suite “The Shaman Dance” (Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra; Richard Hickox, cond.)

Michael Tippett’s New Year

However, there is also a Utopian world of time travel into the future called Nowhere Tomorrow, a world ruled by Regan (dramatic soprano). Their spaceship is piloted by Pelegrin (lyric tenor) and controlled by the computer wizard Merlin (dramatic baritone). The two worlds interact when the computer screen throws up Jo Ann’s anguished face. Pelegrin is drawn to her plight, and when the spaceship eventually lands he finds her in the crowd gathered to see in the New Year.

Michael Tippett: New Year Suite “The Hunt for the Scapegoat” (Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra; Richard Hickox, cond.)

Regan is horrified to discover that the ship has travelled not into the future, but into the past. The world before her is unfamiliar and untamed, and the imagined future is gone. As she is struggling to regain control and assess her authority, people just look upon her in great confusion.

Michael Tippett: New Year Suite “Donny’s Skarade” (Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra; Richard Hickox, cond.)

Meanwhile, Pelegrin and Jo Ann enter a world shaped not by time, but by love and growth. Pelegrin teaches her about the strength of the heart, and he recovers a symbolic rose that Jo Ann had lost. Pelegrin teaches her to become resilient and independent, but eventually, he has to leave.

Michael Tippett: New Year Suite “Donny’s Dream” (Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra; Richard Hickox, cond.)

Jo Ann is finally cured of her fears; she is confident and transformed, and ready to engage with the outside world. The opera closes with a sense of hope and compassion inspired by Tippett’s dream, “One humanity, one justice.”

Michael Tippett: New Year Suite “Dream Interlude” (Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra; Richard Hickox, cond.)

The music of New Year is both lyrical and inventive, with long melodies emphasising continuity over disruption. Tippett creates striking contrasts by blending different musical elements, including a lively rap section, a communal version of Auld Lang Syne, and the electronic sounds of the spaceship.

Michael Tippett: New Year Suite “Jo Ann’s Dreamsong” (Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra; Richard Hickox, cond.)

Michael Tippett’s New Year

The New Year is a theatrically bold and musically refreshing work, capturing Tippett’s unique approach to opera. “It stands as a vibrant and forward-looking piece, one that challenges traditional operatic forms while staying true to his artistic vision. It’s a fitting testament to Tippett’s legacy, offering both a reflection on the past and a look toward the future.”

Michael Tippett: New Year Suite “Love Scene for Jo Ann and Pelegrin” (Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra; Richard Hickox, cond.)

In 1990, the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra commissioned a suite drawn from the music of the opera. The resulting New Year Suite does not follow the sequence of the action in the opera but was conceived as an independent concert work in the manner of “Berg’s Three Fragments from Wozzeck.”

Michael Tippett: New Year Suite “Paradise Dance” (Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra; Richard Hickox, cond.)

The Suite unfolds in 13 continuous episodes and is framed by the arrival and departure of the spacecraft and the music for the crowd scenes. The music for the main characters is sounded in the centre sections. While tape sounds evoke the spacecraft, saxophones, electric guitars, and a large battery of percussion provide a bright yet often raw sound.

Michael Tippett: New Year Suite “The Beating-Out of the Scapegoat (the Bad Old Year) (Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra; Richard Hickox, cond.)

As Andrew Burn writes, “The score is brimming with invention, the sinister “Shaman’s Dance,” the quirky march in “Donny’s Skarade,” and the “Love Scene for Jo Ann and Pelegrin” in which a poignant oboe solo is followed by solos for three saxophones highlighting the intimacy of the scene. “The Ringing in the New Year” mixes “Auld Lang Syne” on trombones with jagged and manic string lines.

Michael Tippett: New Year Suite “Ringing in the New Year” (Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra; Richard Hickox, cond.)

Tippett’s score does represent the composer’s musical testament “in the form of a vibrant challenge to the future.” Tippett was responding to a splintered society, not unlike the one we are still facing today. “One humanity, one justice” is still a universal dream, something that Tippett, an outspoken humanitarian and pacifist, completely identified with. His faith in the healing power of dreams and compassion for the outsider is as relevant today as it was then.

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Michael Tippett: New Year Suite “The Space Ship takes off again” (Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra; Richard Hickox, cond.)