Dame Felicity Lott

Never sort of destructively, always encouraging.

And my confidence grew.

Well, I jumped in for Barbara Walker, who was indisposed.

I'd sung Pamina in The Magic Flute in English at the Royal Academy of Music.

And that had gone quite well.

My father came, my parents came to see it, and Dad said, well, at least you didn't bump into anybody or knock over the furniture.

So, I mean, you know, my acting skills were terrific.

But I had the great good fortune of having done that opera in English in that translation.

So I was the understudy and I knew it, which I have to admit was not inevitably the case with things I did at that sort of time of life.

I mean, I was quite lazy, I think, or I was always doing something I shouldn't have been doing, like going out with somebody I shouldn't be seen with or something, I don't know.

My first husband.

And the day, I mean, they just rang up and said, you're on.

Oh, gosh, so...

You go to the ENO and they put the costume on you and they put the wig on you, which was fantastic.

I didn't look like me at all.

It was a great Egyptian thing with this wonderful costume.

And then you have to walk around the stage and work out where you go for the fire and water trials and who everybody is and meet Tamino and Sarastro and maybe your mother, the Queen of the Night, and

They didn't have time, really.

Straight on.

I mean, I think jumping in is a wonderful thing to do because there's kind of no expectation of what you're going to do before, is there?