Guardian 26,031 – Crucible

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A very nice puzzle from Crucible, the clues teeming with musical references.

Not all the clues require musical knowledge, but it would certainly help in a few, and there are a couple of rather obscure words used in the wordplay of 13a and 14a. Crucible pays particular tribute to Giuseppe Verdi and Benjamin Britten, born 1813 and 1913 respectively.

 
 
 
 
 
Across
1. OPPRESS (POP SINGERS)* less GIN
5. MACBETH MAC (computer) B[aron] + THE* – Macbeth is an opera by Verdi (born 1813), based on the Scottish Play
10. ARIA [M]ARIA – the musical that Maria is a leading girl in could be either West Side Story or The Sound of Music.
11. RISIBILITY I in TBILISI*, in (“swamped by”) R[ailwa]Y. To keep the musical theme going, this Iago could be in Verdi’s Otello rather than Shakespeare’s Othello
12. UNISON S in UNION. This is pretty much the only clue where the surface reading has no musical content
13. DERBY DAY (A BYRD)* in DEY (“the pasha or governor of Algiers [when it was part of the Ottoman Empire] before the French conquest” )
14. ORCHESTRA SHE* in CT in ORRA (Scots word for “odd”)
16. AUDEN Alternate letters of vAlUeD bEiNg. W H Auden was a friend of Benjamin Britten (whose centenary year this is)
17. SCORE I’m not sure whether this is a double or triple definition – a score is twenty, or “music in a lot of bars”, and “film” could either just belong to the music, or be an actual film, such as this one (slightly NSFW)
19. EDWARDIAN D[elius] in E WARD (a minor) + (IN A)*
23. NAPOLEON (NOEL OP A N)< Napoleon Bonaparte was a revolutionary, at least in his early days; the "early 19th century piece" is either a cannon or (perhaps more likely) a coin
24. TUSSLE S in LUTES*
26. OBLITERATE (A LIBRETTO)* + E[gg]
27. AIDA A1 (perfect) + DA (hairstyle)
28. IRKSOME (MIKADO SCORE)* less CODA*
29. ASCENDS AS C[ycle] ENDS – reference to The Lark Ascending by Ralph Vaughan Williams
Down
2. PARTNER PAR (standard) + T[u]NER
3. REAPS RE[c]APS
4. STRINGS Double definition – complications as in “strings attached”, and a section of the orchestra
6. ALBERT B in ALERT for Queen Victoria’s consort
7. BILLY BUDD BILL (poster) + BY< + U (posh) DD (Doctor of Divinity). Billy Budd in an opera by Britten, from the novella by Herman Melville, currently playing to great acclaim at the Glyndebourne Festival
8. TITRATE TIT (songbird) + RATE (tempo)
9. ISADORA DUNCAN (RADA DUOS)* in INCAN – Isadora Duncan was an American dancer who was famously killed in a bizarre accident in which she was strangled by her own scarf
15. HARMONIES O + N in (i.e. “boring”) H[otel] ARMIES (hosts)
18. CHAMBER Double definition – a chamber orchestra is a small one, and a chamber pot might be a “wee container”
20. ANTHEMS EM (printer’s space, larger than an en) in HASN’T*
21. ALLUDED LOUD less O (“none the less”) in ALED [Jones, singer]
22. TE DEUM TEDIUM with a change of vowel from I to E. Nowadays this hymn is sometimes pronounced “tay dayum”, but it’ll always the tee dee-um to this ex-choirboy
25. SPARE Anagram of PEARS (reference to Britten’s partner, the tenor Peter Pears), and also of REAPS (3d)

28 comments on “Guardian 26,031 – Crucible”

  1. Thanks Andrew and Crucible.
    What a clever crossword! I needed your parsing of DERBY DAY and ORCHESTRA among others, but the musical knowledge did help.
    My first thought for “Jones the singer” was Tom, of course, but Aled came a close second.
    The only disappointing one was CHAMBER – I don’t see how the “wee container” can be “chamber” rather than “chamber pot”.
    I had no idea about the DA in AIDA – thanks for the link.

  2. Thanks Crucible and Andrew.

    I needed a bit of Wiki help with the music.

    I particularly liked ‘the controversial’ in 5. For 17, I would have thought that ’20, film music’ would have been sufficient – not sure why ‘in a lot of bars’ adds much. NAPOLEON and EDWARDIAN were enjoyable.

  3. 1 @ muffin – Collins gives ‘chamber’ as short for chamber pot, even if it sounds odd.

    Nice puzzle – put ‘carolean’ instead of NAPOLEAN, but not too distraught as I didn’t think it was the best of a generally fine bunch.

  4. Thanks for a great blog, Andrew – lucky you!

    A welcome return to the weekday slot for Crucible – and on top form. A lovely theme and a lovely puzzle.

    I have ticks all over the place [great surfaces throughout and some ingenious constructions] but must give a special mention for the 22/28 link. And I loved the ‘wee container’ [muffin, my grandma always called it a ‘chamber – and I see Chambers says, ‘often called merely chamberer ‘].

    Huge thanks to Crucible for a thoroughly enjoyable puzzle.

  5. re 16ac: Alan Bennett’s “The habit of art” is about a meeting later in life between Britten and Auden. I’ve seen it (and didn’t particularly enjoy it, in fact), so this was my first in.

    Doesn’t the “pitch” in 12ac count as “musical content?

  7. Sorry, ulacsa, crossed with you re ‘chamber’.

    I have to disagree with you re NAPOLEON: it was one of my favourites – great use of ‘revolutionary’ and also ‘piece’ in a musical puzzle.

  8. More apologies, ulaca, for mis-spelling your name – and to muffin for more crossing. [I’ll shut up now and practise typing more quickly.]

  9. Great puzzle Crucible and thanks Andrew for the blog as although I managed to solve everything eventually I was unable to parse quite a few e.g. AIDA and NAPOLEON. Like Robi @2 I needed a little help from Wiki. (I do find it can also be a distraction as I have now read all about William BYRD trying to solve 13ac and in an attempt to parse NAPOLEON much of his page too!).

    I solved CHAMBER using the clue without thinking, but see what you mean Muffin @1. I remember being fascinated by such pots as a child and loved the term ‘gazunder’.

    When I filled in ISADORA DUNCAN I had a flashback to a TV biopic, I think it must be the BBC film about her (made in 1966 by Ken Russell). My Mum had told me how her life ended before we watched and it is still that part with the scarf that I recall best.

  12. Thanks, Andrew

    Enjoyable puzzle from Crucible. I solved it faster than yesterday’s Rufus – familiarity with the musical references helped a lot.

    NAPOLEON was my last entry: a clever clue. Favourite was 7d for its surface and construction.

    muffin @5: Doesn’t ‘pitch’ in the clue for 12a read as ‘sports ground’ in the surface, rather than ‘musical frequency’?

  13. Ulaca and Muffyword: me too! I reasoned CAROL = “Christmas opus”, + *A NE (“revolutionary”) from “NEw early”. Wrong century, though I think

    Thanks, Crucible and Andrew.

  14. I liked 7d, 9d, 5a, 19a, 2d, 28a and my favourites were 18d CHAMBER & 17a SCORE which I parsed 17a as a triple def: 1/ 20; 2/ film music; 3/ in a lot of bars.

    New words for me were DEY & TITRATE.

    I couldn’t parse 27a, 29a,14a (ORRA), 23a (the “Christmas opus ” bit).

    Thanks Crucible and Andrew.

  15. Thanks for the blog, Andrew. Lovely puzzle.

    I didn’t see the wordplay for ORCHESTRA, so it took a while for the penny to drop.

    And I was another one who put CAROLEAN, despite knowing it was the wrong century 🙁

  16. I thoroughly enjoyed this right up to the very last one to go in, where I too stared at Carolean for ages before realising it just wouldn’t do, and finally got Napoleon from the letters and realised it must be right, but still couldn’t parse it – so thanks Andrew for the explanation. Thanks too, of course, to Crucible.

  17. Here’s yet another “Carolean” solver! Thoroughly enjoyed the puzzle and the blog, though. Thanks everybody.

  18. Thanks Andrew and Crucible

    A very satisfying puzzle notwithstanding my need to check ‘dey’, ‘titrate’ as a verb, and ‘napoleon’ – my last in.

    On reflection I liked that clue (23a) a lot – I first thought of carolean but it ultimately made no sense, and then Jacobean which helped even less. I took ‘revolutionary’ simply to refer to the reversal, though Andrew’s comment also helps the surface which is very cleverly misleading in a ‘musical’ crossword.

    Re 18d, I have fond memories of going to see the Crazy Gang in the 1950s. They did a protracted sketch on ‘The Scarlet Pimple’ reminiscent in retrospect of Ernie Wise’s extravaganzas. At one stage, they announce that Robespierre’s spies are coming. The script goes something like
    ‘Hide the prisoners in the secret chambers!’
    ‘Where are they?’
    ‘Under the secret beds, of course!’.

    As Eileen I have lots of ticks -11a, 19a, 23a, 28a, 9d, 18d, 21d and 22d.

  19. Thanks Andrew. Though a musical ignoramus I enjoyed this and got through without aids. Puzzled though by the wording of 28a (which you have explained), and in 14a it seemed it should be He not She who was nervous. I learned Dey today.

  20. Eileen @ 7 – on reflection, I’m sure you’re right about NAPOLEON; I’m just sore because I met my Waterloo.

  21. Had to look up Britten operas to get Billy Budd. I’d worked out the second name was probably -UDD, but only Elmer Fudd sprang to mind and I was pretty sure Britten wouldn’t have based an opera around getting dat wabbit.

    Dey and Orra were also new, checked after writing in the solution, and represented interesting ways of completing the wordplay. I daresay I’ll have forgotten all about them by the next time I need to be able to recall them.

    Thanks, Crucible, and to Andrew for the splendid blog.

  22. First-class puzzle and blog. Thanks.

    The link between 3 and 25 reminded me of a puzzle from long ago.
    1ac Analyse spare fruit(5) – easy,peasy – PEARS. 1dn Cuts down spear production(5) – also easy – PARES. Nice link with 1ac though. The R and S helped with a couple more across but 2dn and 3dn proved troublesome so moved on. Arrived at bottom right to find the last one across, Analyse spare fruit(5). Hello? And last one down – Cuts down spear production(5). Hello again.

    Turned out that 1ac was PARSE, with PEARS the last one across. The last one down was REAPS.

  23. Thanks for the blog, Andrew. I was feeling pleased to have completed this without any aids until I realized I was a member of the sizeable group that opted for CAROLEAN (I never could justify the E, anyway). Also needed help understanding DEY in 13a, ORRA in 14a, and DA in 27a. Regardless, a very enjoyable solve and an engaging theme. Thanks, Crucible!

    Oh, having solved 25d before 3d, I almost went with PARES for 3d (which works but for the lack of an anagram indicator).

  25. In a late comment on Redshank’s FT crossword (from exactly a week ago) I wrote: “I am a bit surprised by the lack of comments as I thought this was a marvellous crossword, full of original ideas (…..). I have said it before but, for some reason, I really prefer Redshank to his alter egos (which produce very good puzzles too! [don’t get me wrong]”.

    Indeed, don’t get me wrong.
    This was a brilliant puzzle.
    I seem to remember that Crucible did a musical puzzle before but the more the better.

    Great surface in 19ac (great use of ‘E minor’ too).
    And how good to see ORCHESTRA clued in a very different way!

    Thanks Andrew.
    Suspected DA to be a haircut but never heard of it.
    Although, we left the possibility open that it might be a word for ‘hair’, cut.

    Tremendous stuff.

  26. I had the requisite amount of GK to be able to finish what may otherwise have been a tricky puzzle reasonable quickly. I enjoyed it.

    “Carolean” never occurred to me, although “Jacobean” did, before I discounted it due to its lack of parsability and the fact that it was wrong by a couple of centuries. I finally saw the wordplay and entered the correct NAPOLEAN. MACBETH was my LOI, again helped by the wordplay. I solved STRINGS before ORCHESTRA, and the latter was a write-in after getting the former so I didn’t bother to parse it, although I do know “orra” so I probably would have been able to work it out from the wordplay had I needed to.

  27. For ORCHESTRA I suppose it would have been an old chestnut (horse) to use the famous anagram for the word, but I found the clue bloody difficult to be honest! Whoever heard of ORRA? And something inside something else, well, all right then. Generally good though.

    Themed isn’t it, with no difficult words, which people often spot and go on about. Very nicely done by Crucible.

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