1. The text chosen by Tippett expresses Hudson’s empathy with nature, which stands out all the more powerfully for coming after a passage that describes the unimaginable stench of the Saladero, the killing-grounds where cattle, horses and sheep were slaughtered in their thousands every day. Tippett’s model for Boyhood’s End was Purcell’s ‘Blessed Virgin’s Expostulation’, a work he greatly admired.

2. Shams ud-din Muhammad (d. c.1390), Persian poet and philosopher, whose Divan contains ghasels that sing of love, flowers, wine and nightingales.

3. Popular name for the Great Kiskadee, Pitangus sulphuratus, so called because of its exuberant BEE-tee-WEE call. ‘Bien te veo’ = ‘I see you well’ in Spanish. The bird can be found from southern Texas and Mexico to Uruguay and central Argentina.

4. A wading bird of South and Central America: Aramus guarana.

5. aquatic plant.

6. The Allamanda flower, also known as Yellow Bell, Golden Trumpet and Buttercup Flower is native to South and Central America, and derives its name from Dr Frédéric-Louis Allamand (1735–1803), a Swiss botanist.