The amateurs were not out of it completely. The Voluntary Chorus, as they became known, still supplemented the Chorale in the big choral operas. When distinguished bass Richard Van Allan first sang Zaccaria in Nabucco with the company, there was no prior dress rehearsal because everyone knew the production so well. Van Allan rehearsed only with the Chorale, and was merely warned that on the night the stage would be a little more crowded by the added presence of some seventy amateurs. Pushing his way through this crowd on opening night, he was about to sing his first line when he felt a tug on his sleeve from an agitated member of the Voluntary Chorus. ‘I stand there,’ the man said; ‘been standing there for years.’ ‘Well you’re not standing here tonight,’ hissed Van Allan, turning to deliver his opening line.

Van Allan was just one of many young artists given their first chance of a leading role by WNO. Never having had resources of some other opera companies, WNO has always had to survive by attracting young talent before they became too expensive. Among famous names given their first opportunities by WNO schoolteacher Stuart Burrows; Gwyneth Jones; Margaret Price and Delme Bryn-Jones. From further afield came Glyndebourne chorister Josephine Barstow, whose appearances as Violetta brought London critics who agreed she was a talent and would go far. Then there was Thomas Allen, a young graduate of the Royal College who had been coached there by WNO’s musical director James Lockhart. Allen made his professional debut in a school hall in Haverfordwest, singing Baron Douphol in La traviata.