Who is popular today?

Oliver Cotton’s The Score, a new drama about Bach’s confrontation with Frederick II, continues a rich tradition of plays about great composersYou wait decades for a play about Johann Sebastian Bach and two come along. Oliver Cotton’s The Score, dealing with Bach’s confrontation with Frederick II at Potsdam in 1747, opens at the Theatre Royal Bath in October and stars Brian Cox. You could argue that Nina Raine’s Bach & Sons, which played at London’s Bridge theatre in 2021 and starred Simon Russell Beale, might actually have been called Succession since much of the action hinged on which of his offspring the testy patriarch would finally favour.What is surprising is how many plays there are about great composers. You could say that is down to the success of Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus, but even before that dramatists were drawn to musical divinities: Sacha Guitry’s Mozart, with Yvonne Printemps as the hero, played in London in 1926. I would put the current popularity of musical biodramas down to a number of things. The fact that many composers have led lives streaked with violence; that there is often a disjunction between the musical genius and the man (and, sadly, in drama, it is rarely a woman); and there is a never-ending debate about the composer’s obligation to society as well as the creative impulse. Continue reading...