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Performing Britten

First broadcast from 20070218 to 20070422.

Series focusing on the operas of Benjamin Britten.

John Evans talks to singers, conductors and directors about performances and recordings with which they are closely associated, and about the problems and pleasures of performing Britten.

10 episodes

Episode	Title	First Broadcast	Description
01	Paul Bunyan	20070218	American director Francesca Zambello discusses the operetta Paul Bunyan, Britten's first attempt at a stage work, written in America in the early 1940s in collaboration with W H Auden
02	Peter Grimes	20070225	Tenor Philip Langridge talks about tackling one of Britten's most famous operatic roles, the tormented Suffolk fisherman Peter Grimes
03	The Rape Of Lucretia	20070304	Dame Janet Baker talks about performing the demanding title role in the chamber opera The Rape of Lucretia.
04	Albert Herring	20070311	Conductor Richard Hickox discusses his recording of Britten's only comic opera, Albert Herring.
05	Billy Budd	20070318	Britten expert John Evans talks to distinguished interpreters of Britten's operas about performances and recordings with which they are closely associated, and about the problems and pleasures of performing Britten. Young baritone Simon Keenlyside discusses his interpretation of the title role in Britten's all-male opera based on a story by Herman Melville and set aboard a British man o' war during the Napoleonic Wars.
06	Gloriana	20070325	Josephine Barstow talks about performing the role of Queen Elizabeth I in Gloriana, written to celebrate the coronation of our present Queen.
07	The Turn Of The Screw	20070401	A series in which John Evans talks to distinguished interpreters of Britten's operas about performances and recordings with which they are closely associated and about the problems and pleasures of performing Britten. 7/10. His guest is the veteran director Basil Coleman, who worked closely with Britten during the 1950s. Coleman also directed the premiere of Britten's chamber opera The Turn of the Screw, based on Henry James' famous ghost story, at the Teatro La Fenice in Venice in 1954.
08	A Midsummer Night's Dream	20070408	He talks to Sir Peter Hall about A Midsummer Night's Dream, first performed at the 1960 Aldeburgh Festival. Sir Peter directed a memorable revival of the opera at Glyndebourne in 1981, and having also directed performances of Shakespeare's play, is well-placed to discuss Britten's treatment of this much-loved text.
09	Owen Wingrave	20070415	He talks to conductor Steuart Bedford about Britten's penultimate opera, Owen Wingrave. The opera is based on a Henry James story about a young man with strong pacifist convictions who refuses to go along with his military family's wishes and join the army, with tragic consequences.
10 LAST	Death In Venice	20070422	His guest is singer John Shirley-Quirk who in 1973 played the multiple bass-baritone roles in Britten's last opera Death in Venice. Based on Thomas Mann's novella about a dying writer visiting Venice who becomes obsessed with a beautiful adolescent boy he sees on the beach, the opera was Britten's own swan-song, written while the composer was gravely ill.