The friend of Britten, who helped launch our fundraising
— remembered by Zeb Soanes
ZEB SOANES WITH LADY PENN, ANSTRUTHER, 21 MARCH 2022
Lady Penn, died on November 20th, aged 97. Prue had a wonderful capacity for making new friends of all ages, even in her ninth decade. I was fortunate to be one of them.
Prue led a remarkable life: a close friend of The Queen and Princess Margaret and former Lady-in-waiting to the Queen Mother — she was at the heart of Palace life for over 70 years and had a phone conversation with Queen Elizabeth II just 10 days before she died.
During the Second World War she worked at MI6, sharing an office alongside Kim Philby, who turned out to be a KGB spy.
Prue adored music. The radio by her kitchen door was permanently tuned to Classic FM and she was quite determined I should lure Alexander Armstrong to visit her one day — ‘Do you promise?’ she would implore with a chuckle. She had great friendships with Sir Frederick Ashton, Raymond Leppard and Sir William Walton. I once spent a happy afternoon leafing through her copious correspondence with William Walton in which, purely for their own amusement, they feigned a wild comical romance. Prue was a little concerned about how the letters might be interpreted when she was no longer around but the problem was solved by her attaching an explanatory covering note to the bulging ring-binder.
Key to Britten as a Boy, Prue was a very close friend of Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears. She was a trustee of the Aldeburgh Festival and, with her late husband Sir Eric Penn (one time Comptroller of the Lord Chamberlain’s Office), she lived for a number of years at Sternfield, just up the road from Snape Maltings. The Queen Mother often came to stay to attend concerts at Britten's concert hall, which was opened by the Queen in 1967. Prue told me the dramatic story of how she was driving home one evening and thought an ominous orange glow in the sky was a fire at her own house, only to realise it was the newly built concert hall at Snape. When she drove over to the Maltings she witnessed Britten and Pears in tears, helplessly watching the flames destroy their dream, only two years after it had opened. It was Prue who then led the fundraising to rebuild the concert hall, re-opening in time for the Aldeburgh Festival in 1970.
BENJAMIN BRITTEN (1913 - 1976) AND PRUDENCE PENN WITH A MODEL OF THE SNAPE MALTINGS CONCERT HALL, 14 MAY 1970 © Evening Standard/Getty Images
When I first discussed the idea for a statue of Britten for Lowestoft, Prue was captivated by the concept to depict him as a boy, to inspire future generations of local children to achieve their dreams. She enthusiastically sent emails to those friends of hers who had also known and worked with Britten. It is Prue we have to thank for the generous support of Dame Janet Baker and Sir Thomas Allen and for obtaining our very first donation from Lord Fellowes. I spoke to Prue just weeks before she died, not knowing quite how ill she was at that time and she apologised for not being able to do more practically to help. She thought Ian Rank-Broadley’s maquette for the statue ‘a perfect likeness.’
The early surge of support for the Britten as a Boy campaign owes much to Lady Penn’s enthusiastic engagement and we thank her. I will miss her fond friendship, being able to pick up the phone to her, that mischievous sense of humour, her ‘bossy breakfasts’ whenever I stayed and the wonderful stories from a remarkably full life.
Lady Penn, born January 12th 1926, died November 20th 2023
