Sex and lies in Ancient Rome will be on the menu for Festival’s second outing.

One of last year’s more remarkable comebacks was the last minute emergence of Brisbane Baroque, rising phoenix-like from the ashes of the short-lived Hobart early music festival. Thanks to the foresight of the Queensland government, Leo Schofield and Jarrod Carland were able to mount a full-scale assault on the Australian awards system and bag a stunning five Helpmanns, putting an 18th-century wind up the likes of Opera Australia who had to scrape by with the leftovers.

Despite what was dubbed by some in the media as “bogan-gate” – the mini-storm that blew up when Schofield branded the Tasmanian’s intellectually unworthy of a decent arts festival – Australia reckoned the inaugural Brisbane Baroque a triumph. Launching next year on the back of all that, the 2016 festival looks bigger and better than ever with a slew of top international artists, a strong field of the best of the Aussie early music scene and a Handel opera that reads like a musical fusion of I Claudius, Up Pompeii and Sex, Lies and Videotape.