"Of all the works of Shakespeare that I know, there is none in which music is so often mentioned and plays such a great role as in The Tempest. Each person can be characterized musically, even Caliban the captive slave; he has eyes and ears for the stuff dreams are made on. For months, years, I devoted myself to Shakespeare's The Tempest, read it again and again in many countries and cities and in every season of the year, through all changes in weather and mood. I have frequently read it alone, filled with despair, then studied it again systematically together with Glen Tetley. I remember how I went walking over the aqueduct at Spoleto - the masterpiece of the great architect Gattapone - Shakespeare under my arm and the ballet in my heart, without knowing at the time that this magnificent structure had already been admired by Goethe, and painted by Turner.

The task was to put The Tempest in a new musical setting. It would have been impossible to carry out without the stimulating collaboration of Glen Tetley. It was he who brought me to understand his singular concept that music can be compared to a time machine that propels forward both men and action; it is the driving mechanism which keeps everything moving - like Prospero his universe." Arne Nordheim.