This year, in addition to our usual three performances of Messiah, we’re also doing a shortened version, the Beginner’s Guide to Messiah, during which the conductor will explain the work, its history, its structure etc to the audience. The idea is to make it more “accessible” to those people who have heard about Messiah, but don’t really know what it is.
As an added feature, at various points in the performance Miriam Margolyes will be reading extracts from Handel’s diaries.
It sounds like an interesting concept and I’m quite looking forward to seeing how it all works.