Death in Venice
Sunday 22 April 2007 15:00-16:00 (Radio 3)
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.
Playlist:
10/10. 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.
