As before, Nézet-Séguin shows himself to be an excellent Mozartian. Time and again he beguiles the listener with subtle phrasing, whether it be the diminuendo that closes Despina’s ‘In uomini’ or the tenderness of the violins’ fourfold question and answer towards the end of the duet for Dorabella and Guglielmo. His allowing Fiordiligi to pause at the top of her rising phrase helps to make the Allegro of ‘Per pietà’ a cry of despair rather than a mere showpiece. Such delicacy is offset by force elsewhere: when Guglielmo shows Ferrando the proof of Dorabella’s fickleness, the orchestral interjections are Beethovenian in their ferocity. In fact there are times, such as the trumpet fanfares in Guglielmo’s ‘Donne mie’, when the volume is disproportionately loud.

The cast is led by Miah Persson, whose enchanting portrayal can be seen in the Nicholas Hytner production from Glyndebourne (Opus Arte, 3/11). As well as the heartfelt ‘Per pietà’ already mentioned, she despatches ‘Come scoglio’ – the irony of Fiordiligi comparing herself to a rock – with gleaming tone and noble fervour. Angela Brower is described as a mezzo but her voice is light and she has no trouble with the high notes; she is ideally matched with Persson, indeed, even if it is sometimes hard to tell them apart in the recitatives. Mojca Erdmann is suitably vivacious as Despina but, whereas Persson decorates her line with grace, Erdmann is stratospherically noisy.

Don Alfonso, the puppet-master, suffers from having no proper arias. Alessandro Corbelli makes his mark in the ensembles through his idiomatic attention to the text. Like everyone else in the cast, he handles the secco recitatives with an ease and naturalness unusual in a concert performance. Rolando Villazón scales his Verdi-size voice down effectively, with only a hint of sliding. The end of ‘Tradito, schernito’, 18 seconds in one breath, is stupendous. Adam Plachetka makes a genial Guglielmo, honeyed in ‘Il core vi dono’. The officers’ duettino is included but not Ferrando’s ‘Ah, lo veggio’. All most enjoyable.