Performer: Matthew Sprange

Wet English summer weather may have driven Bampton's pacy revival of Salieri's wickedly funny La scuola de' gelosi indoors, but rain could not dampen the sheer fun ahead. 

That Rossini was a wag. The master of the bon mot, you suspect he probably had his tongue firmly in his cheek when he entitled his 1864 choral work the Petite messe solenelle.

Rarely performed, Verdi's fifth opera Ernani is full of fiery passions, with a relentless flow of melodic invention, as heard in this concert performance by Chelsea Opera Group. 

A very concise, two-act opera which tells a bleak wartime tale of sacrifice, rarely performed and never realised to the satisfaction of its own composer. You could be forgiven for thinking I was describing something from 20th-century Germany, perhaps an expressionist work taking after Berg’s Wozzeck or similar. You’d be wrong.