Glyndebourne’s association with the music of Benjamin Britten extends back to the early 1940s. Benjamin Britten and Glyndebourne’s then Chairman John Christie were not obvious colleagues. They had very little in common. Both were from very different backgrounds, John Christie being a recipient of the Military Cross while Britten spent World War World II years in the US as a conscientious objector.

Glyndebourne staged the premiere of The Rape of Lucretia in 1946 and in the following year, the premiere of Albert Herring. After this premiere, Britten commented of Christie as “a mischievous, mad old man”.

Britten wasn’t invited back, and 34 years of the Glyndebourne Festival elapsed until another of his operas, Midsummer Night’s Dream, was staged in 1981. Glyndebourne has since gone onto acclaimed productions of The Turn of the Screw, Billy Budd, Owen Wingrave, Death in Venice, Albert Herring and this acclaimed Trevor Nunn production of Peter Grimes from 2000.

Peter Grimes premiered in London in 1945 and was the first of Britten’s operas to be a critical and popular success. This 2000 Glyndebourne production is no exception. The role of Peter Grimes is amongst the toughest company on disc, with a heritage laid down by Peter Pears and Jon Vickers. In this recording Anthony Dean Griffey has the lyricism of Peter Pears and the weight and size of voice of Jon Vickers and above all is totally convincing in entering the mental state of Grimes. Vivian Tierney is an authoritative Ellen Orford, compassionate yet lonely and vulnerable, and likewise utterly convincing.

Cast:
- Peter Grimes, a fisherman: Anthony Dean Griffey
- Ellen Orford, a widow, schoolmistress of the Borough: Vivian Tierney
- Captain Balstrode, retired merchant skipper: Steven Page
- Auntie, landlady of The Boar: Susan Gorton
- First Niece, main attraction of The Boar: Camilla Tilling
- Second Niece, main attraction of The Boar: Linda Tuvas
- Bob Boles, a fisherman and Methodist: John Graham-Hall
- Swallow, a lawyer: Stafford Dean
- Mrs Sedley, a rentier widow of an East India Company’s factor: Jard van Nes
- The Rev Horace Adams, the rector: Wolfgang Ablinger-Sperrhacke
- Ned Keene: Christopher Maltman
- Hobson: Michael Druiett
- Dr Crabbe: Michael Haughey

‘… perhaps the finest interpretation of this role [Griffey/Grimes] to date… Vivian Tierney … the embodiment of ineffectual bourgeois liberalism … Steven Page’s Balstrode …forcefully hectoring.’ - The Guardian, 26 June 2000

‘The performance is memorable for the superlative playing of the London Philharmonic under Mark Wigglesworth …’ - Sunday Telegraph, 2 July 2000

‘The LPO under Mark Wigglesworth were on top form, superbly delivering the nuances of Britten’s famous instrumental virtuosity in the interludes …’ - Opera Magazine, September 2000