Performer: Oliver Barlow

Gorgeous French music, polished choral singing and excellent soloists are marred by an overwhelmingly dark timbre and unsympathetic video.

A strong revival cast, conducted by Dalia Stasevska, demonstrate why Sir Peter Hall's 1981 vintage staging of Britten’s A Midsummer Night's Dream is such a classic. 

Nothing quite ordinary or indeed comforting here, the heavy mixture of acid colouring in Lindberg, Ustvolskaya and Stravinsky not tempered by any opulence in Rachmaninov.