Alban Berg’s first opera Wozzeck, written between 1914 and 1922 before premiering in 1925, is generally regarded as the first opera to be produced in the twentieth century avant-garde style. It represents one of the most famous examples of atonality and also features some Sprechstimme, an expressionist vocal technique that sits between singing and speaking. The story is based on Georg Büchner’s play Woyzeck, which was left incomplete when he died in 1837. From the...

Premiering in 1945, with a libretto adapted by Montagu Slater from George Crabbe’s eponymous narrative poem, Peter Grimes focuses on the type of outsider figure that always fascinated Benjamin Britten. Set in a nineteenth century Suffolk coastal village referred to simply as ‘the borough’, it focuses on the clash between Grimes, a hard working fisherman who dreams of wealth and respect, and a narrow-minded and repressive community who will never judge him kindly,...

Benjamin Britten’s Billy Budd, which premiered at the Royal Opera House in 1951 before undergoing revisions in 1960, is based on the eponymous novella by Herman Melville, and has a libretto by E. M. Forster and Eric Crozier. With the main action set aboard the HMS Indomitable in 1797 during the French Revolutionary Wars, the story centres on Billy Budd who at the start is pressed into serving in the Royal Navy from a merchant ship. He has a lot of positive attributes including...