rivals for its "sheer freshness of musical invention". Grimani's libretto has also been praised: The New Penguin Opera Guide describes it as one of the best Handel ever set, and praises the "light touch" with which the characters are vividly portrayed. Agrippina as a whole is, in the view of the scholar John E. Sawyer, "among the most convincing of all the composer's dramatic works". Style Stylistically, Agrippina follows the standard pattern of the era by alternating recitative and da capo arias. In accordance with 18th-century opera convention the plot is mainly carried forward in the recitatives, while the musical interest and exploration of character takes place in the arias—although on occasion Handel breaks this mould by using arias to advance the action. With one exception the recitative sections are secco ("dry"), where a simple vocal line is accompanied by continuo only. The anomaly is Otho's "Otton, qual portentoso fulmine", where he finds himself robbed of the throne and deserted by his beloved Poppaea; here the recitative is accompanied by the orchestra, as a means of highlighting the drama. Dean and Knapp describe this, and Otho's aria which follows, as "the peak of the opera". The 19th-century musical theorist Ebenezer Prout singles out Agrippina's "Non ho cor che per amarti" for special praise. He points out the range of instruments used for special effects, and writes that "an examination of the score of this air would probably astonish some who think Handel's orchestration is wanting in variety". Handel made more use than was then usual of orchestral accompaniment in arias, but in other respects Agrippina is broadly typical of an older operatic tradition. For the most part the arias are brief, there are only two short ensembles, and in the quartet and the trio the voices are not heard together. However, Handel's style would change very little in the next 30 years, a point reflected in the reviews of the Tully Hall performance of Agrippina in 1985, which refer to a "string of melodious aria and ensembles, any of which could be mistaken for the work of his mature London years". Character Of the main characters, only Otho is not morally contemptible. Agrippina is an unscrupulous schemer; Nero, while not yet the monster he would become, is pampered and hypocritical; Claudius is pompous, complacent, and something of a buffoon, while Poppaea, the first of Handel's sex kittens, is also a