O pera’s stories of power aren’t only played out on stage. The mechanics of producing opera involve vast amounts of people, from set builders to wig-makers to chorus and orchestra, and even vaster amounts of money. An opera company needs huge reservoirs of cash: whether from governments, companies donating for tax benefits, or private individuals whose motivations may be entirely driven by sheer love of the form, or they might not. The Royal Opera House named a hall after the American investment banker Alberto Vilar who promised the company £10m, before being convicted and imprisoned for fraud in 2010 , while the Sackler family’s millions sponsored swathes of culture across the US and UK – but the source of this wealth gave the world an opioid epidemic . So pity the poor opera house manager, trying to deal with an essentially insoluble situation: choose your donors, choose your poison.…