Britten’s Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra started life as music for an educational film, designed to acquaint young people with the character of the various instruments and instrumental choirs that make up the modern orchestra. The work is a series of variations each spotlighting the individual instruments and each with a different character – some tender, some slightly sardonic, some mysterious, some straightforwardly humorous, all charged with great originality and wit. Britten’s Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge were written as a homage to his teacher. Based on Bridge’s Three Idylls for String Quartet (Naxos 8.553718), they proved immediately popular, launching Britten’s international career and securing his place in British twentieth-century music.