HIGHLIGHTS packages are rarely the best way to get the full picture of an opera. But Purcell's third semi-opera responds well to the treatment.

Though loosely based on A Midsummer Night's Dream, it doesn't in fact set a single line of Shakespeare. Rather it is a series of musical cameos that comment on the play.

Shorn of the spoken words, they make a pleasing entertainment on their own.

Armonico's backbone is a period band that invests Purcell's rhythms with an infectious vigour. Its chorus, made up of the eight soloists, does not blend quite so readily. But individually they have their moments.

Elin Manahan Thomas gives a bright Hark the Echoing Air, and the comedy of Coridon and Mopsa is well exploited by Thomas Guthrie and William Towers.

Still, the orchestra is what really grabs one's attention here.