Owen Wingrave

Owen Wingrave is an opera for television in two acts with music by Benjamin Britten, his Opus 85, and a libretto by Myfanwy Piper, after a short story by Henry James. BBC television commissioned an opera from Britten in 1966. In 1968, he and Piper started working on the libretto. The work was completed by August 1970. Britten had been aware of the story since his work on a previous opera, The Turn of the Screw, also based on a Henry James story o... more

Owen Wingrave is an opera for television in two acts with music by Benjamin Britten, his Opus 85, and a libretto by Myfanwy Piper, after a short story by Henry James. BBC television commissioned an opera from Britten in 1966. In 1968, he and Piper started working on the libretto. The work was completed by August 1970. Britten had been aware of the story since his work on a previous opera, The Turn of the Screw, also based on a Henry James story of the same name. The premiere was recorded at Snape Maltings in November 1970 and first broadcast on BBC2 on 16 May 1971. The music is influenced by Britten's interest in 12-tone serialist techniques. A large tuned percussion sections heralds the treatment in his next (and last) opera, Death in Venice. In addition to being an expression of Britten's own pacifism, he was reported as saying that this opera was partly a response to the Vietnam War. Britten originally intended the work for both television and the stage, although after the stage... less