This sparked the idea for my first opera, later entitled Rael, whose plot deals with Israel being overrun by Red China. Over the next year I developed the story, and planned to complete it as a major full-length operatic composition outside my work for The Who. I hired a Bechstein upright piano from Harrods and installed it in Karen’s bedroom in her flat in Pimlico. I wrote the first orchestrations there for Rael using a book called Orchestration by Walter Piston that I still refer to today.
