This disc includes one of the great highlights of the whole Britten discography, that first magical recording of the Serenade, with Pears in fresh, youthful voice and Dennis Brain's marvellous horn obbligatos, creating frisson-making echoes in Tennyson, dark melancholy in Blake, and rippling away exuberantly in Johnson's 'Hymn to Diana'. What playing! The transfer is faithful; but why on earth couldn't Decca have removed the surface rustle, and above all, the clicks? The coupled Walton Façade, however, was a consummate technical and artistic miracle of Decca's mono era. Edith Sitwell and Pears deliver the engagingly preposterous words with bravura insouciance, Collins conducting the English Opera Group Ensemble with matching wit and flair, and even today the 1953 recording sounds almost like stereo.

who better than the poet herself to act as reciter, sharing the duties with Peter Pears in this classic recording from 1953, conducted by Anthony Collins. Both Pears and Sitwell bring an arch, deadpan style to their recitation that suits this piece perfectly.