The Turn of the Screw (opera) composer conducting. Described as one of the most dramatically appealing English operas, the opera in two acts has a prologue and sixteen scenes, each preceded by a variation on the twelve-note 'Screw' theme. Typically of Britten, the music mixes tonality and dissonance, with Britten's recurrent use of a twelve-tone figure being perhaps a nod to the approach of Arnold Schoenberg. Thematically, the play gives a central role to a line borrowed from W. B. Yeats' poem "The Second Coming": "The ceremony of innocence is drowned." The opera was given its British premiere on 6 October 1954 by the Sadler's Wells
The Skating Rink (opera) The Skating Rink (opera) The Skating Rink is an opera by the British composer David Sawer. Sawer's fourth opera, it premiered on 5 July 2018 at Garsington Opera as a new commission from the opera company. The libretto by Rory Mullarkey, who also wrote the libretto for Mark-Anthony Turnage's opera "Coraline," is based on the novella of the same name by Roberto Bolaño. The story takes place in the coastal town of 'Z', on the outskirts of Barcelona. The opera is divided into three acts, with its story told by three male narrators (one Mexican, one Chilean, and one Spaniard),