Peter Hall (Other lives, 3 January) deserves admiration not only for his winemaking and persistence with the vineyard at Breaky Bottom, but also for his commitment to opera. Without his support, New Sussex Opera would never have got off the ground. Its short-lived predecessor was Breaky Bottom Opera, which in 1977 mounted Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas in Peter’s barn, cleared of cows, freshly whitewashed, and with hay bales installed for audience seating.
The orchestra was a string quartet, and the chorus of four, of whom I was one, were dressed in black squares, looking like teabags, with our heads, hands and feet sticking out of them. It was triumph enough to lead on to NSO’s grand productions of Mussorgsky’s Boris Godunov and then Britten’s Peter Grimes at Sussex University. Both were spectacular successes.
