Let’s start with the fundamental that you mentioned ‘ that opera is the core of Handel’s work and that thank God we’re finally realising not only that, but that we have grossly underestimated the richness of these scores. Many of us in the past, and I include myself, have glanced at the many volumes, forty-two or how ever many there are, and put them away. But returning to them again and again as I’m now doing, thinking what can I do next, I begin to get past the things that put us off in modern times; the idea of the absurd plot or the female voice taking male roles. These are things that have prevented our seeing how great the music is. Now we are not only recognising that it is great music, but we’re also finding ways to overcome this prejudice against the tradition. One of those is that we’ve discovered that someone like Carolyn Watkinson can not only be a good Nerone, she can also be a good Ariodante. That has led to some great singers taking on these male roles and not only vocally doing them splendidly, but also acting them on stage. Now we have more and more women who, without being masculine themselves, can convincingly assume a masculine quality both as to the voice and the action that is heroic in a way fitting for these eighteenth century heroic characters. It has also helped that gender has become a fashionable issue - ambiguity of gender is increasingly recognised and accepted. There are singers in the pop world who have made it more universally acceptable, so a modern opera audience is not necessarily going to expect that all the female singers have female roles and vice versa. That has directly affected the viability of putting Handel operas on the stage. Another thing that’s currently fashionable and has helped is that absurd and complex baroque plots are now appreciated, and even enjoyed. People don’t have to either take something very seriously or laugh at it, they can do both and laugh at something serious. Possibly that’s something to do with a world situation that’s so full of hideous absurdities all we can do is laugh. It means that when the heroine sings ‘shall I stab myself or take this poison’ ‘ which occurs three or four times in Handel’s operas ‘ it can of course be ridiculous and just slapstick, but it can also be done with a sense of irony, with a sense of playfulness and at the same time be something to be taken seriously and can allow the singer to think seriously.

I grew up musically in a university environment. In American universities the performance of music is not only encouraged, but rewarded in a way that it can’t be in a European university, where musicology is pretty restricted