We now have some detail on the TV broadcast of the EU expansion celebrations, which includes Roger Waters premiering fifteen minutes of his new opera, Ca Ira.

German presenter Nina Ruge will be hosting the show in the Konzerthaus at the Gendarmenmarkt in Berlin, where she will greet the Europe-wide audience (expected to be over a billion) and showcase each of the countries joining the EU. The music performed in the studio will be interspersed with live feeds from the second venue of the evening: an open-air stage in Warsaw in front of the old Royal Castle.

There will be two "countdowns to accession" due to the differing time zones; the second of which, at midnight Central European Time (CET), will feature the dramatic climax to the whole event - the music of Roger Waters' Ca Ira (describes as the pre-premiere of the piece) alongside the spectacular "Light Monument", a firework display of light and colour on a gigantic scale created by world-famous light artist Gert Hof.

The broadcast will begin at 10:15pm CET, and countries around Europe are still signing up to the live feed; closer to the time, we should have more detail on TV stations carrying the show.

Roger's opera, now looking to be released at the end of the year, was written for an 84 piece orchestra, three soloists (tenor, baritone and soprano) and an adult and children's choir. The libretto was written by Frenchman Etienne Roda-Gil. The committee behind the EU expansion celebrations felt that there were strong parallels - Ca Ira deals with the French Revolution as a metaphor for people's strength in their fight for freedom, equality and fraternity - "values that today still embody the ethical foundations of the European Union" (Expansion committee statement).