So when did you decide to make a company? Well we had no idea that this was going to happen at all. Marshall mentioned the Royal Ontario Museum. We came back and a wonderful woman by the name of Ann Roberts asked us to do some small performances there because not all of the galleries had reopened when they had their renovations. And we did that. And in 1985 it was the Boktor Centenary. The ROM commissioned us in March of that year to do something about Bach. So we were able to use our Baroque knowledge. We got together with members of Tafel Music, put together a small orchestra. And it actually sold out for three days. We staged one of his humorous contaters. Yes. And added dances and that sort of thing. He did it in the foyer. In the theatre. That was in the theatre of the ROM. You see we had, we moved to the theatre because amazingly enough, although we had been told by somebody people that this theatre, this style of theatre didn't speak to people any longer. It wasn't an interest to people. When Jeanette and I first showed up at the museum, this marvelous woman Ann Roberts, she was there on contract. She didn't go through any of the proper channels that was marvelous thing about Ann asking if we could perform there. She simply said, come in with your costumes. We'll plug a tape recorder into the wall. And I'll make an announcement saying this is a performance happening. So, and those days, she was able to go to the front desk. She took the microphone and sort of punched, whatever happens she had to and said there will be a demonstration of Baroque dancing in the such and such gallery on the third floor. In 15 minutes, we hope that you'll join us. Well, the audience, the number of people who came to watch, it was already incredible. People were so fascinated. People from the museum came to watch because they were infuriated. They were wondering how this happened because it hadn't gone through any of the correct channels. But there was such an obvious interest. They said, well, fine, this can continue, but it will happen at regular times and come in twice a week. And we'll start to announce it. And we continue plugging in our tape recorder and doing that until the fire marshal said, too many people are standing and watching. And it's also endangering the artifacts who have to move. And that's when they moved us into the lecture hall. And we stayed in the lecture hall in essentially a little stage for about three productions. Yes, we did three there. And then after that, there were so many people attending. And this is without our explaining, no one is in remission, people just seeing Baroque dancing and singing and acting. That we were told that we couldn't perform in the lecture hall any longer, that we would have to move. And we were offered to the art gallery of Ontario when the Vatican splendor exhibition opened there. And this was 1985. And this would be late 86. We had done three little productions in the wrong theatre, and then we moved to the ADO. And when was the Duke came to my front door to ask Lord, my wife, was that so pennies? That was probably for the Bokhtor centenary, our first costumes. That's right. When we had the pennies made. Yes, our history goes back along. Unbelievable. Unbelievable. And we had just kept growing on its own. Yeah, we had thought we'd be freelance performers in Toronto, because we knew we didn't want to do anything like the Moulin Rouge ever again. And, but luckily, something that was a real interest for us was able to turn into a career. We were at the Royal Ontario Museum, or rather at the art gallery of Ontario, for several productions performing in Walker Court. We could see two, three hundred people. The last day of our production of Julius Caesar in Egypt handles Julius Caesar in Egypt. So many people were lined up outside, wanting to see it. That we just let everyone in, and we broke all of their safety regulations, and we were told that we'd never be allowed to perform at the AGO again. So when did you realize that you had producer jeans in you? About then, I would say. Yes, we slowly got an office together as well, which helped, but at the beginning we did everything. No, I shouldn't say that. Actually, we had those large institutions behind us. Yes. Doing the publicity, etc. So that helped tremendous... The region's nailings for us. I mean, we were actually able to use the ROM and the AGO because we were part of their programs and public relations. Yes, in terms of producing, we've never... We are producers of opera, but we've never done the publicity administration, that sort of thing. We did a few grant applications, but that's about it. Yes, it was... I mean, we did need to do our grant applications initially. You did the grant applications. But it was a company that grew through word of mouth, through people coming in at the right moment and saying they wanted to assist us, they wanted to help us in some way. Yes, some wonderful singers came to us and we have a very loyal audience. It continues to grow. It's never stopped growing, but many of the people have been with us since those ROM days. But it grew in such an organic way. And so it was taking on a life of its own, even before we realized what was happening. We had to move into a real theater because we were kicked out of the AGO and we moved into the theater at the... The University of Toronto. The University of Toronto. Yes, yes. But by then, we had incorporated. We were told that if we wanted to solicit funds, we would have to be a charitable nonprofit organization. And it never struck you as absurd that two Canadians in 1986, 88, in a very modern city would create an opera company about not just the recent power, but the more distant power. Well, we had wonderful, taffle music with us right from the start. So they were doing the same thing with instrumental music. It all seemed quite natural. There was context the entire time. Plus, it was something that we loved. We started doing this because of our interest in the music. And particularly, in where jumping all over Robert, but Jeanette and I had both been involved in productions both with the Canadian opera company and music in the square in Kitchener Waterloo. And there were times that in productions of Mozart or 18th century opera, that choreographers would give us choreography to dance for them like seribans or muets or walls. And invariably, the choreographer wouldn't know what to do with that music. So we've been given something very embarrassing and a feat to dance. Invariably, the ideas seemed to be, oh, well, these are aristocrats. And they were all slightly in bread and they wore those odd clothes. And it's very easy to turn that into something hilarious and cheap and fee. And we invariably would end up doing things that we found embarrassing. And at the same time, the music was ravishing. This is after or before you studied before. Well, during, before you got into it. We were still having to work other jobs for several years before we could do this. You've already studied the Mulan Rooshy's already studied the music. This was actually before you went over my CIC. So we were already dancing with the opera company. We knew what opera was. We knew what opera rehearsals were like. But we couldn't get over sort of the lack of respect that was shown for this music. And meanwhile, we were reading in top music programs that the menu was the most popular dance in Europe for 200 years. Do you think the most popular dance for 200 years? Well, it certainly can't be this foolishness that we're going through on stage. And this foolishness doesn't match this beautiful, glissering diamond-like music. And what really started us was thinking, well, what is it in your head? Does anyone know? Does anyone know what a seraban is? Like I thought, a jig or knurring it. And if we don't know, then how do people know how to play them? This is what fascinates me, both about yourselves as artists and the company you've created. Innovation and creativity is often associated with leaping down the road ahead, you know, trying to create absolutely new forms. But you let down the road behind. And in fact, recreated and created an aesthetic that obviously people were thirsty for. And that's the form that by, because my sort of preconception is you always had to go forward to innovate. But what you taught me is you can go that way and it can be just as innovative. Absolutely. And you can re-enawake in aesthetics and talk about the human experience in some very profound and spectacular ways by going out. We have to take a granted that things have been lost. Sometimes things are lost for good reasons. Sometimes they're not lost for good reasons. Sometimes things are lost because of politics, because of spiritual issues, because of religious issues. Economics. Yes, economics. I mean, why did people stop performing the spectacular operas and valleys that were written for Louis XIV, Louis XVI? It wasn't because they were no longer theatrically viable. It wasn't because they were inferior. It was because the revolutions that shaped the 19th century, it was impossible in that atmosphere to produce music that was written to glorify what was seen as a repressive and even fascist regime. You simply couldn't do it. This repertoire was untouchable. It was tinted. So that would explain why baroque operas not done in 19th century, early 20th century. Absolutely. Why do opera companies around the world mainly land in 19th century opera still? They forgot that it existed. They forgot that there was such a thing. There were no recordings. There was nothing to keep Baroque opera alive. Did Bach's The Church of Commusica disappear? No. Did Handels Messiah disappear? Absolutely not. But of course they know about them now. Yes. But they have their 19th century chestnuts which they know will sell. And I'm so glad you said that about going to the past being innovative because many people don't see that. They still think you have to keep doing something more and more innovative. It becomes rather repetitive actually. But so I think the mainstream opera companies either do the mainstream repertoire from the 19th century or something avant-garde. In my not-year moments it's like musical theater, perpetually doing showboat and then the MIS and Kat. And Pajama Game might go well if your musical theater why aren't you going down there? Why are you repeat recycling? Because it turns into a commodity. It's something that costs so much to produce. And people are looking at the bottom line constantly. If we were going to be looking at the bottom line we would never even have dreamed of starting this company.