<p>A boy time ago, when I was still a kid, back in provincial Westphalia, I came across the title (not the music, and not any lyrics) of “<em>Molly on the Shore</em>”. Who was this Molly? I kept asking myself (was she Irish? or Scottish?) and who was Mr Grainger, the composer?</p><p>I eventually found out, ages later, and in London, as my friend Olly’s (Oliver Knussen’s) 50th birthday came nearer and nearer I thought I’d write him a piano piece with the same title (except for the initial M) and think of him most affectionately while he, our Olly, is standing on the Suffolk shore, near his lovely house, looking out across the ocean, looking and calling out for a world of wonderful images made of sounds and rhymes and tunes still to come, in order to fill out the next 50 years in the life of Oliver Knussen, the brilliant mind, the gentle man, and the great artist.</p><p><em>Hans Werner Henze.</em></p>