Henry Purcell’s Dido & Aeneas gets all the credit, but in fact it is his mentor John Blow’s Venus & Adonis of 1683 that wins the prize for First English Opera, predating it by six years. Since the latter was only unearthed a mere century ago, it has some ground to make upon its more famous rival.

For its finale this year, York Early Music Festival helped along that process in a cautious move towards opera presentation (which it must surely develop in future), with a semi-staged version produced by Elizabeth Kenny, director of Theatre Of The Ayre.

That the show was such a triumphant success owes much to casting at every level. Not only did we have such aces as Rachel Podger and Pamela Thorby leading the strings and recorders respectively. Kenny herself and David Miller are also two of the best Baroque strummers in the business, whether on lutes, theorbos or guitars.

The singers were hardly less accomplished. Sophie Daneman’s irrepressible Venus went to the very extremes of ecstasy or elegy, nowhere more than in her reactions to Adonis’s untimely death in the hunting field, heart-wrenching indeed. Giles Underwood’s more restrained, but firm, Adonis was still wittily observed.

Special credit goes to young Laura Soper’s confident, clear-toned Cupid, delivered by heart with warm personality. She was ably backed up ten little locally-schooled Cupids (some very little, from Dringhouses Primary). The adult quartet doubled well as a choir, especially in the final lament, with Jason Darnell finding a Verdian bravura in his huntsman’s song.

The context had been well set with three Blow songs and a ground (the fluent Podger) and three glimpses at the French court. But the opera was a cut above, dramatically so.