The Passing Bells the conclusion of the war. The series was announced by the BBC in October 2013, along with other programmes that played a part in the BBC World War I centenary season. It was a Red Planet Production with BBC Worldwide as the distributor. Filming took place in Poland. Telewizja Polska and Apple Film Production were co-producers. The series aired in the pre-watershed time-slot of 7pm, and the script was written for a younger audience and family viewing. The title was taken from the first line of Wilfred Owen's 1917 poem, "Anthem for Doomed Youth": "What passing-bells for these who die
The Bells (symphony) Death" in 1896. Nikolai Tcherepnin would write a ballet on the same subject in 1922. Nikolai Myaskovsky composed his symphonic poem "Nevermore", based on "The Raven," in 1909. At the same time Rachmaninoff composed "The Bells", his compatriot Mikhail Gnesin was writing "The Conqueror Worm" for tenor and orchestra, based on Balmont's translation of "Ligeia." "The Bells" is scored for soprano, tenor, and baritone soloists, mixed choir, and an orchestra of piccolo, 3 flutes, 3 oboes, cor anglais, 3 soprano clarinets, bass clarinet, 3 bassoons, contrabassoon, 6 horns, 3 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, 4 tubular bells, glockenspiel, triangle, tambourine,