Our ears had been purified, refined into the most subtle distinctions of resonance by baroque harp and voice, so that the sound of a modern wind quintet burst on our ears like a thunderstorm after gentle sunshine.
This venue, purpose built for chamber music, has been described as the best chamber music concert hall in Australia.
In just half an hour, I was alone, face to face with a screen on which was someone older than me whom I’d never met and would be most unlikely ever to meet again.
It is rare indeed to attend a work whose dramatic place is less than a kilometre from its place of staging.
The Australian Haydn Ensemble are an early music orchestra at the top of their game.
I doubt that this opera will ever make it into the standard repertoire. Yet congratulations to the Festival organisers for putting it on especially in the current circumstances.