Lambert started composing the score in Paris, but due to the distractions of other work he had to enlist assistance for the orchestration from younger colleagues, such as Robert Irving, Humphrey Searle, Gordon Jacob, Alan Rawsthorne and Elisabeth Lutyens.
[2] One of three ballets commissioned for the Festival of Britain, Lambert's score is roughly contemporary with French composer Francis Poulenc's short comic opera Les mamelles de Tirésias first performed at the Opéra-Comique in 1947, on a similar sex-change theme, based on Guillaume Apollinaire's surrealist text of 1917.
[1] The critical reception was generally negative, and the composer instructed solicitors to challenge the hostile review by Richard Buckle, which cast aspersions on the entire artistic leadership of the Royal Ballet company.
Another interlude transforms the scene to a palace courtyard where Zeus and Hera are arguing whether men or women get most pleasure in sex.
[8] The first broadcast performance of Tiresias, using the score edited by John Abbott,[9] took place on 8 November 1995 [10] with the BBC Concert Orchestra conducted by Barry Wordsworth.