Talk:Children's Crusade (Britten)

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A fact from Children's Crusade (Britten) appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 22 November 2020 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that Benjamin Britten (pictured) composed Children's Crusade, with text by Bertolt Brecht, as a piece to be performed by children about a group of children in wartime Poland?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2020/November. The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Children's Crusade (Britten).

Wikipedia

Did you know nomination[edit]

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Cwmhiraeth (talk) 06:36, 14 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

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Benjamin Britten in 1968

... that Children's Crusade is a composition by Benjamin Britten (pictured) setting a text by Bertold Brecht about a group of children in war-time Poland, to be performed by children? Source: [1]

Reviewed: Overa-Aru Wildlife Sanctuary
Comment: In my little series to supply something for 22 November, Britten's birthday on St Cecilia's Day, patron saint of music. He is pictured exactly the year when he began the work, but the hook is long already.

Created by Gerda Arendt (talk). Self-nominated at 21:21, 12 November 2020 (UTC).[reply]

As ever an enjoyable and enlightening piece! Entry is long enough, recent enough; maybe just one suggestion of either paraphrasing or explicitly marking off in quotation the description of the 6 elements of the music from the source site?

And if I may suggest a slight trim to the hook—perhaps clipping the final phrase “to be performed by children” for the sake of brevity? Or to propose an alternative (which I realize belatedly is not shorter, but maybe the active voice snaps a bit more? I’m not wedded to it.)

ALT1: ... that Benjamin Britten (pictured) composed Children's Crusade, creating a piece for children to perform from a text by Bertold Brecht about a group of children in war-time Poland?

Or:

ALT2: ... that Benjamin Britten (pictured) composed a piece for children to perform from a Bertold Brecht text about a group of children in war-time Poland?

That one at least has the virtue of brevity but I don’t feel terribly strongly in any direction. What say you, Gerda?

Innisfree987 (talk) 00:34, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you so much for taking up a dark subject immediately, and the suggestions. I love active voice but usually do a lot to have the subject at the beginning. In this case, however, celebrating BB, it's fine to have him first. I usually do a lot to preserve the subject unpiped, so like ALT1 MUCH better than ALT2. We probably don't have to worry about the image as the prep has already a lead hook, but just for other purposes: GRuban, would it be possible to crop such a pic slightly, to get a little closer to the person? Innisfree987, please keep watching, I'll add to the article, - I just nominated prematurely when I saw the timing constraint. - I had no idea Britten ever set Brecht, that should be a good thing to know for all, and as it happens, this year the day falls on the German memorial day for the dead. Finally: I wanted to link to the piece from recent articles, - that woke me up ;) --Gerda Arendt (talk) 08:50, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I could, or one of you could, the crop tool on Commons is pretty easy to use, but probably easiest still is to use this one which is already made:

--GRuban (talk) 13:06, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you! I was't sure if we may touch some photographer's artwork, and forgot about the other although I must have seen it that memorable day. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 13:45, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

We may absolutely touch the photographer's artwork: this is a wiki! We edit stuff! Sometimes ruthlessly! For images, where which is "better" is often a matter of taste, we're usually encouraged to make a new version, so the other one is also there for people to use. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Benjamin_Britten has something like five or six versions of this photo in just this way; if none will do, and you really want, you can add a seventh. --GRuban (talk) 14:22, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you, - I already used the Bencherlite version for most of his works. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 16:29, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

All good by me, and for my two cents, that 2013 crop is really very nice, perhaps the hooks could be rearranged for this “special occasion” DYK.

Following! Innisfree987 (talk) 16:39, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds nice, just the bot needs a tick ;) --Gerda Arendt (talk) 16:43, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, my bad, I thought you wanted me to look at more changes first—Earwig picks up those summaries of the composition’s six scenes. Are those the official titles, should they be marked in quotes? Or paraphrased if descriptions? Innisfree987 (talk) 17:08, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know (yet). We could comment it out for the time being, or I perhaps know more later today or tomorrow. Still busy with the recent death ... --Gerda Arendt (talk) 17:25, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Good solution, looks good to me! Innisfree987 (talk) 17:56, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]