Powerful women in Handel’s Day

Mary Bevan (photo: Vicotira Cadisch)

Curtain up on some fascinating, seductive female characters: Medea, Cleopatra, Semele and the Queen of Sheba. They all inspired George Frideric Handel to write great music for his operas and oratorios, arias filled with virtuosity and emotion. No composer of his time was better at endowing the personalities of these women with musical glamour. To open our Baroque Weekend, the Academy of Ancient Music under Laurence Cummings, with soprano Mary Bevan, will introduce us to some of Handel’s most powerful, headstrong heroines.