The Rape of Lucretia is the most problematic of Benjamin Britten’s operas. Recent productions of Gloriana, the opera Britten wrote to celebrate Queen Elizabeth’s coronation, have proved that its notoriously unsuccessful première in 1953 had more to do with an uncomprehending audience than with the piece itself. But the problems with Lucretia (first performed on 12 July 1946, at Glyndebourne) are inherent in the opera.

In spite of its ultimate enormous success, Britten’s opera Peter Grimes (1945) had been rehearsed in an atmosphere of tension and hostility. A vocal section of the Sadlers Wells Company made no effort to hide their dislike of Britten’s ‘modern’ music, homosexuality, and conscientious objection, to the extent that the baritone singing the leading role of Balstrode suddenly quit weeks before the opening. In these circumstances it was obvious that Britten would have to find another venue for his next opera. It made practical sense to write a smaller scale work with a more compact orchestra, but Britten was already leaning in that direction anyway.