Working with other musicians, Pears sang an extensive repertoire of music from four centuries, from the Tudor period to the most modern times.

The biographers Christopher Headington and Donald Mitchell both remark on two contrasting strands in Pears's heredity: the Luard family was notable for its naval and military connections, and on his father's side there was a strong religious tradition, both Anglican and Quaker, with Elizabeth Fry counted among his ancestors.

He showed considerable talent for music, both as a pianist and as a singer, playing leading roles in school productions of Gilbert and Sullivan operas.

[5] Lancing had a strong Christian tradition; while there, Pears felt a sense of vocation for the priesthood, but increasingly found this impossible to reconcile with his growing awareness of his homosexuality.

He was not at this stage sure whether his musical future was as a singer or as player; during his brief time at the university, he was appointed temporary assistant organist at Hertford College, which was useful practical experience.

In the event Pears did not take to Oxford's academic regime, which required him to study a range of subjects before specialising in music.

He later said that it was hearing the tenor Steuart Wilson (a distant cousin) singing the Evangelist in J S Bach's St Matthew Passion that "started me off".

[10] He successfully applied for admission to the Royal College of Music in London, first as a part-time student and then, having been awarded a scholarship, studying full-time from 1934.

[11] He appeared in student productions of opera, finding himself wholly at home on the stage, and learning from the experience of singing Delius under Sir Thomas Beecham and roles in works by Mozart and Puccini.

[14] Headington comments on "a thoughtful word delivery and a sensitive moulding of quietly flowing phrases, but also a certain whiteness of tone ... a kind of English cathedral sound.

Britten's first work for him was composed within weeks of their meeting, a setting of Emily Brontë's poem, "A thousand gleaming fires", for tenor and strings.

[18] Pears took vocal lessons from the eminent Lieder singer Elena Gerhardt, but they were of limited help to him, and it was some time before he found a wholly suitable voice coach.

[21] When the Second World War began, Britten and Pears turned for advice to the British embassy in Washington and were told that they should remain in the US as artistic ambassadors.

[14] As the war was nearing its end, the artistic director of Sadler's Wells, the singer Joan Cross, announced her intention to re-open the company's home base in London with Britten's new opera Peter Grimes, casting herself and Pears in the leading roles.

[36] Dismayed by the in-fighting among the company, Cross, Britten and Pears severed their ties with Sadler's Wells in December 1945, going on to found what was to become the English Opera Group.

Reviews of the opera were mixed, but Pears's performance as Albert, the mother's boy who kicks over the traces, received consistently good notices.

[43] For the inaugural festival, Albert Herring played at the Jubilee Hall, and Britten's new cantata Saint Nicolas, was presented in the parish church, with Pears as the tenor soloist.

[46] His other creations at Aldeburgh included the Madwoman in Curlew River (1964), Nebuchadnezzar in The Burning Fiery Furnace (1966) and the Tempter in The Prodigal Son (1968).

[47] At Covent Garden he created roles in operas by Britten and Walton: Vere in Billy Budd (1951), Essex in Gloriana (1953), and Pandarus in Troilus and Cressida (1954).

[48] The music critic David Cairns wrote, "Pears's interpretation of the evangelist's part in the Bach Passions seemed complete as no other singer's: it encompassed every turn in the drama, the pity, the anger, the despair, the resignation.

[51] As well as his performing partnership with Britten, Pears established another with Julian Bream, who, as a lutenist, accompanied him in many works, most notably those of English composers of the Tudor period.

With Murray Perahia, Pears gave performances of such works as Britten's Michelangelo Sonnets and Schumann's Liederkreis to critical acclaim.

[3] The critic Alan Blyth described it thus: Clear, reedy and almost instrumental in quality, it was capable of great expressive variety and flexibility, if no wide range of colour.

But so great was his skill and so subtle and imaginative his musical sensitivity and mastery of inflection that it conveyed, together with his air of patrician authority, an extraordinary richness of atmosphere and feeling.

[14] Pears's other Decca recordings range from early music by Dowland, Schütz and their contemporaries to Walton's Façade, and include such varied repertory as the Emperor in Puccini's Turandot, the title role in Stravinsky's Oedipus Rex, and the tenor part in Berlioz's L'enfance du Christ.

[14] His recordings for other companies include the role of the Evangelist in Bach's St Matthew Passion (Otto Klemperer's 1961 EMI version), the tenor part in the same composer's Mass in B minor and Fauré's La bonne chanson.