My young companion and I arrive at the Glyndebourne estate in the south-east of England for one of their summer operas. A newcomer to the festival, he surveys the rambling gardens, the opera theatre and the rolling landscape stippled with grazing animals. He drinks in the fresh, perfumed air and pauses. “But what’s it doing in the middle of a sheep paddock?” he asks, quoting from that iconic Australian movie The Dish.

Opening night at Glyndebourne. Photo © James Bellorini Photography

An unlikely bucolic setting for what is perceived as a form of high art, the Glyndebourne Festival Opera in East Sussex has been an annual event since 1934, except for a hiatus during World War II and in 1993, when the purpose-built theatre was constructed. The company presents six operas over three summer months at its rural estate, owned for centuries by the Christie family. Today, I am here to see Handel’s Alcina, directed by Francesco Micheli with Jonathan Cohen conducting the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.

The modern history of Glyndebourne began with John Christie (1882-1962), who inherited the estate in 1920. In 1931, Christie married soprano Audrey...