Not real French of course, but fantasy French, the world of boulevards, the Goncourt diaries, Offenbach, L’opéra comique (around the turn of the last century of course), Colette, Apollinaire, Poulenc – and, of course, Massenet – who I discovered at the age of 14 when I found a score of his almost unknown Le mage in a junk shop, and relished its preposterous kitsch. Of all of his operas, Grisélidis is my comfort opera – the equivalent of a rainy afternoon in front of a golden age Hollywood movie. It is tender, sweet, never-never, almost completely irrelevant to the stresses of our revolting age, probably unstageable at present in the light of its innocently anti-feminist source, and more.

It covers all genres – comic, farcical, faux-religious, amorous, dramatic, poignant. Yes, the score limps a little in the last Act, but its conclusion is gorgeous sham-medieval corn, mixed with a witty boulevardier throw away last word from my erstwhile colleague — a not too sharp one — Le diable. For years I knew it from playing through the score, then an earthbound recording with Michele Command which divested the work of much of its fragile magic (the live Wexford one is better) — but with the blessed advent of Palazzetto Bru Zane, I can hear this sweet piece in a performance both idiomatic and polished.