We turn to Knighton’s own current research work, still much concerned with Spanish music of the 15th and 16th centuries. This year sees the 400th anniversary of the death of Phillip II, an occasion that will be marked by a book she is in the process of preparing with three Spanish colleagues. She makes a point of mentioning the impressive strides taken by Spanish musicology in recent years, equating them with the equally impressive and coincidental developments in performance practice.

Back to Early Music and I ask Knighton how she felt the magazine had developed since those pioneering days. “I think it has changed to reflect the alterations in the scene. In those early issues there was a greater concentration on instruments and how to make them—that kind of thing. There are those who still think of the magazine in those terms, having not seen it since! As the players and makers have become more professional, the value of that kind of focus has diminished.” This leads us onto one of those “golden age” discussions, it having been suggested by some that the excitement of the days when players were grappling with such matters as new bowing techniques or getting a respectable sound from a natural horn had carried with them an aura of trail-blazing excitement and edge-of-seat unpredictability now consigned to the past. Knighton also voices concern about what she terms “the degree of exploitation” that has taken place in the wake of the firm establishment of period performance practice—musicians now entering the field the easy way, without experiencing or thinking about the problems encountered by the first generation of players and directors.