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Dumaux, a penetrating male alto, proved a breezy Caesar.

Ms. Rial shared the vocal numbers in this 90-minute program with the male alto Vincenzo Capezzuto, and alas, I — alone, to judge from the audience response — couldn’t develop a taste for his boyish, bodiless sound.

The countertenor voice, in the sense defined by Tippett as "a male alto voice of exceptional range and facility", had fallen into decline by the early 19th century, restricted to the choir stalls of English cathedrals and churches and the striped blazers of barbershop groups.

By the end of the 19th century the voice type had all but vanished; on the rare occasions when baroque operas were staged, the male alto roles were typically taken over by women in drag.

To further befuddle historians, Handel was continually juggling arias to fit whatever boy soprano, male alto or countertenor happened along.