I grew up in Lowestoft, where the 
North Sea crashes into or caresses the coast, depending on the weather, and where the land begins or ends, depending on your mood. Here, at Britain’s most easterly point, Britten grew up too, in 
a cliff-top house overlooking the powerful panorama of the sea – the harbour back then would have been full of trawlers, now sadly gone, but the biting wind, squawking seagulls and mist-muffled fog horns would all have been familiar. I don’t claim this gives me any special insight into Britten’s works, but I do fancy I can hear the Suffolk coast, 
its atmosphere, both beautiful and bleak, evoked in his music. 
And it does give the music a special resonance for me, as all great music should for listeners who take it to their hearts, of course.

Music can often be rooted in a place, which at its best allows the music to take the essence of that place far and wide: the countryside around the Malvern Hills, the Alhambra, the Suffolk seas. Yet 
visiting the actual places where composers were inspired can be 
both powerful and informative, as those who make the annual journey to the reed beds around Britten’s Snape Maltings will attest.

On the anniversary day itself (November 22), Britten’s birth-town plays host to Noye’s Fludde, conducted by Britten expert Paul Kildea – and we were delighted that he agreed to write this month’s cover feature, exploring how Britten revived the genre of English opera.

This issue brings to an end our coverage of the major composer anniversaries of the year – Britten’s, Wagner’s, Verdi’s – all of 
which have been opportunities, admirably seized upon by labels, festivals, opera houses and concert halls, to look afresh at the familiar and unfamiliar. Aside from Richard Strauss, next year’s anniversary composers are not perhaps as high-profile, though do include Gluck, CPE Bach and Rameau. I look forward 
to discovering the creative ways these anniversaries may be marked – though 
I have to admit that the events of 2013 
will be a hard act to follow.