Cello suites (Britten) The suite is in nine movements, played without pause: The score was published in 1966. The Second Suite dates from the summer of 1967. Rostropovich gave the premiere at the Aldeburgh Festival, Snape Maltings, on 17 June 1968. The score was published in 1969. The movements are as follows: Britten composed the Third Suite in 1971, inspired by Rostropovich's playing of the unaccompanied Cello Suites of Bach. Rostropovich first performed the suite at the Snape Maltings, 21 December 1974. The Third Suite is in nine movements, performed without pause: The work incorporates four Russian themes, including three arrangements of folksongs
John Culshaw commissioned Britten's opera "Owen Wingrave," written expressly for television. He also persuaded Britten to conduct television productions of "Peter Grimes" and Mozart's "Idomeneo", and to accompany Pears in Schubert's "Winterreise". Britten and Pears invited him to Snape, not far from their base at Aldeburgh in Suffolk and he encouraged them to transform the Snape Maltings into a concert-hall. He later initiated the Benson and Hedges music festival at Snape and was planning the fourth season at the time of his death. Some of his BBC programmes have been preserved on DVD, including films of the Amadeus Quartet playing works by