In a season that sees Pinchgut Opera make its debut on the Sydney Opera House’s Joan Sutherland Theatre’s stage, the city’s Baroque opera specialists will present some of the most enduring works in the repertoire.

And if that sounds a little like reaching for the Greatest Hits formula, so be it, says Pinchgut’s Artistic Director, Erin Helyard.

“2023 has been a turbulent year, to say the least,” Helyard tells Limelight. “A white-knuckle ride to be honest. Like a lot of other arts organisations, we’ve had a lot of ups and downs at the box office and it’s hard to really fathom a reason for that. But I know that a lot of our arts audience has felt safe to travel for the first time since the plague years and that must have an impact.”

It does feel like normality is resuming, Helyard says, “but I would be lying if I said the 2024 programming wasn’t a response to some of the things we’ve experienced this year. But I’m also looking to my colleagues in centuries past. Handel saw that opera wasn’t working so he switched...