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Britten sails off to America for a new life with his companion Peter Pears

From relatively humdrum origins in the coastal fishing port of Lowestoft, Benjamin Britten rose to become the pre-eminent British composer of his day, celebrated not just in his native land, but internationally. Although he would initially see himself as an outsider to the British musical establishment, he would rapidly transform music-making in Britain, introducing new sounds, and insisting on the highest standards of performance. By the time of his death in 1976, in the arms of his long-term companion Peter Pears, Britten was celebrated as a composer of operas, string quartets and song cycles, and of a War Requiem that touched the hearts of millions of listeners around the world.

Amid the national influenza outbreak, illness struck Britten's sister, and subsequently his mother. Although his sister would survive, his mother would not and her death both closed one chapter, and opened another in his life. Her legacy allowed him to buy the Old Mill at Snape, and it was there he completed work on his uncharacteristically dazzling Piano Concerto ? a popular success, but a critical failure.

As Britten came to terms with his homosexuality, he sought companionship among members of his own sex, meeting Peter Pears and a wider circle of friends.

The complexity of Britten's own romantic attachments is demonstrated by his settings of poems by Rimbaud, in Les Illuminations. And as Donald McLeod observes he was also capable of a popular touch, setting Auden's thought-provoking lyrics on the nature of love in a set of Cabaret Songs.

From good friends, flatmates and travel companions, Britten and Pears become lovers whilst in America. But they enjoyed mixed fortunes there, and feeling homesick they decide to head back to the UK in 1942. Aboard the ship home Britten completes his last collaboration with Auden: Hymn to St Cecilia.