Last week, as if out of nowhere, Donald Gordon gave 20 million to be shared equally between the Royal Opera House and the Wales Millennium Centre. But why? “In the UK, Gordon is not known as a philanthropist. He has given money to Sadler’s Wells, Shakespeare’s Globe and the British Museum, but, he says, these donations were a matter of ‘a few thousand’ and he can’t remember what they were for. So why this unexpected and extraordinary gesture? ‘For the past few years, my major diversion has been the performing arts. Now I am hoping to make the transition from what they call tycoon to opera appreciator’.”