In an interview with local radio in 1969, when Brian was asked ‘What composer influenced you then?’ (in the early years) Brian answered ‘Oh, the Germans’. In Brian’s first opera The Tigers (1916-18), this German influence is obvious in the enormity of the work and his use of thematic material. It is easy, however, to overlook the peculiarly British influences. The work is a ‘Burlesque Opera’ in the very best tradition of English parody most commonly found in the Music Hall. Brian also uses folk-song, not the rural folk-song popularly used by Vaughan Williams, but the folk-song of the newly-industrialised people.

Brian’s opera composition halted until 1951, when Turandot was completed. The reason for this long interlude may be that Brian had written The Tigers as part of a new publishing contract with Cranz, and that either he had nothing more to say in this genre at the time, or that he recognised the English public’s apathy towards British operatic works. Turandot was quickly followed by The Cenci (1952) Faust (1954-56?), and finally Agamemnon (1957). It seems that Brian was never anxious to see these later operas either published or produced. Walker states that, in later years, when Brian’s wife Hilda had said that she did not like opera, Brian quipped ‘I daren’t tell her that I’ve got five operas of my own in the cupboard - if she knew about that, she’d probably throw them all out to the dustman!’. Perhaps, after so many years of his music being met with disapproval by the establishment, he was reluctant to invite further conflict, even from his own wife.

Gerald Cumberland, in his book of reminiscences (1918), wrote: ‘Havergal Brian was in the room... and he remarked, that he found it impossible to write music that the public really liked, "nearly all my stuff," said he, "is on a big scale for the orchestra. I am always trying to do something new, something out of the common rut."’

In a previous interview, with Nettel, after the first performance of his Gothic Symphony in 1966, Brian answered a question that people had wanted to ask for years:

‘Q. No regrets about the years of obscurity?
A. Not a bit. No. I never had any ambition to be a star; I only wanted to get the opportunity and the time to do the work I wanted to do.’

However, this answer seems to be the one that Brian had contented himself with over the years of obscurity. Rapoport, among others, discusses the years of neglect, saying that the reasons are many and varied; that between the wars, at a time when it was not financially viable, Brian was composing work that demanded large orchestral forces. It is also probable that Brian made many enemies in the British musical establishment during his years as a music journalist when he had been in contact with many contemporary composers and their music. For instance in October 1936 in a piece called ‘The Composers Desolation’ Brian wrote that: ‘Apart from the Promenade Concerts, the musical life of this country is as badly organised or as haphazard in its national arrangements as is national defence.’ (M. MacDonald 1986)

As mentioned previously, Brian called Agamemnon and his other works in this genre ‘operas’. His use of the word is significant, as previous to this, ‘in Brian’s own listing of his ‘drama compositions’ this [Faust] was the fifth of the six that he had completed, though most writers, placing Prometheus unbound with the cantatas, list only five. Brian believed that his music dramas contained the best of his creative abilities.’ (Easthaugh, 1976.)

David J Brown also, among others, refers to Brian’s operatic works as music dramas, so implying a strong Wagnerian influence, maybe striving for ‘Das Kunstwerk der Zukunft’. As seen above, Brian was a self-acknowledged Wagnerian and lover of German music and philosophy, teaching himself to read German at an early age. The contradictory nature of Brian’s references to opera and music drama could mean that in his earlier operas, such as Turandot (1950-51), and The Cenci (1951-2), he was striving towards the Wagnerian ideal of music drama; but in the later works, such as Faust (1955-6?) and Agamemnon (1957), had reached a form that he was content to describe as opera.

Brian said, in discussion with Matthew-Walker, that the one-act opera Agamemnon was meant as a curtain-raiser for Richard Strauss’ Elektra. ‘To explain what happens before Elektra begins, you see’. There seem to be many reasons why this could not be a viable proposition, among them the differences between the two orchestras, and the lack of correspondence between voices for some of the main characters in each. Further, the text used by Brian itself presupposes a listener’s prior knowledge of the tragedy.