Grimes at 50
The greatest postwar opera, or just a fluke? In the half century since its first performance on 7 June 1945, how has Britten's
Peter Grimes fared? Is it now an accepted part of the international repertoire or simply an occasional oddity? And how have interpretations of the opera - and reactions to it - changed over the years? Humphrey Carpenter investigates, with the help of performers and observers including Anthony Rolfe
Johnson, Franz Welser-Most and Andrew Porter.
Producer Gwen Hughes