Seven Sonnets of Michelangelo


Seven Sonnets of Michelangelo is a song cycle composed by Benjamin Britten for tenor voice and piano in 1940, and published as his Op. 22. It was written for himself and his life-partner, the tenor Peter Pears. The manuscripts of the songs are dated between April and October 1940; but there is some evidence that the cycle had been contemplated, and even begun, as early as 1937. It consists of settings of seven sonnets, all love songs, by the Italian painter and poet Michelangelo, in the original language:
  1. XVI: "Si come nella penna e nell'inchiostro"
  2. XXXI: "A che più debb'io mai l'intensa voglia"
  3. XXX: "Veggio co' bei vostri occhi un dolce lume"
  4. LV: "Tu sa, ch'io so, signor mie, che tu sai"
  5. XXXVIII: "Rendete agli occhi miei, o fonte o fiume"
  6. XXXII: "S'un casto amor, s'una pietà superna"
  7. XXIV: "Spirto ben nato, in cui si specchia e vede"
In 1974, Pears singled out Seven Sonnets of Michelangelo as one of the greatest works Britten had given him.