By now all the props are stowed in crates, the set is struck, the costumes washed and pressed, and all is over until our Westonbirt performance on 29 August. After three years of poor weather for our Bampton weekend, we were blessed this time with warm evenings (which was just as well as the Figaro performances went on until 10.45pm) and - most importantly - still air. The moon was a bit late rising (for which we chastised our lighting engineer Ian!), but otherwise conditions were perfect. We were delighted to welcome Dr David Cranmer from Lisbon, who has spent the past five years engaged on editing the manuscripts for these performances and who is now looking forward to promoting a new production of Figaro in Lisbon for Marcos Portugal's 250th anniversary in 2012. His pre-performance talks were enlightening and for us personally it was a great pleasure to meet him after years of email correspondence. The audiences were warm and enthusiastic, and the singers and orchestra were unanimous in their enjoyment and respect for this opera. It felt like a vintage Bampton weekend.