Music Theatre Wales is the UK’s leading contemporary opera company and to celebrate our 20th anniversary, we have commissioned McEwan and Berkeley to write a new chamber opera, for which we’re urgently seeking support towards the cost of the production and tour. The work is almost complete and performances across England and Wales are scheduled for May – November 2008. The world premiere will take place in Brecon as part of the 2008 Hay Festival and London performances will be at The Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, where MTW is an Associate Company. McEwan is one of the world’s hottest living writers, with repeated short-listings for the Booker Prize and the recent film of Atonement becoming a huge success. FOR YOU is his first opera libretto and yet again he has shown his razor sharp instincts for story, character and drama, inspiring Berkeley to write his most fluent and expressive music to date. This will be a new opera characterised by the quality and insight of its writing, the dramatic energy and lyricism of its music and the precision and intensity of its production, delivered in the consistently acclaimed high performance standards of MTW, whose singers and musicians are amongst the finest exponents of new music and opera in the UK. This is a new opera that audiences will be hungry to see but it may not happen unless we can secure the enlightened support we need to supplement the income we receive from the Arts Councils of England and Wales and the many Trusts and Foundations who regularly support us. The irony is that there are already two international houses waiting to perform the work, but the company who has commissioned it may not be able to bring it to the very audience it is intended for!