Tossed on the high seas of misogyny, capsized by an overload of anecdote about her character and habits, Ethel Smyth (1858-1944) remained gung-ho (her kind of word) about the professional frustrations she faced. Ahead of Glyndebourne’s new, and rare, staging of her opera The Wreckers (1906), a flurry of articles have celebrated her eccentricities. More importantly, they have drawn attention to her pioneering efforts as a composer, for a time moving at the centre of European musical life. If you don’t know her story, including the bit about the toothbrush, it’s worth looking up.
Smyth’s timing was unlucky. Her three-act opera is spoken of as prefiguring Britten’s Peter Grimes (1945), on the slim evidence that both have a coastal setting and a choral-community presence. Britten’s work, so triumphant from the outset, in effect wiped the British operatic slate clean; Smyth’s work had hardly established itself and now was outmanoeuvred by that of a youthful newcomer. The Wreckers had initial interest after its 1906 premiere in Germany, but fell from view, not helped by Smyth’s tendency to antagonise those around her.
