It was in 2014 that Cecilia Bartoli donned her faux fur hat and headed to St Petersburg to unearth Baroque and Classical treasures at the court of Catherine the Great, mostly by imported Italian composers (Decca, 11/14). Now the Canadian soprano Karina Gauvin follows in Bartoli’s footprints in the snow for an attractive programme, originally given in concert in Vancouver. The ‘Nuits blanches’ title references the Belye nochi, or White Nights, when the sun never quite sets over the city of St Petersburg.

The subtitle ‘Opera arias of the Russian Court in the 18th century’ is a little foggy, though. Unlike Bartoli, Gauvin does feature music by composers of the Russian Empire – Dmitry Bortnyansky and Maxim Berezovsky – although two of the operas represented here were composed and premiered during their time studying in Italy. And a large section of the disc is given to arias from Gluck’s Armide – music of the 18th century, certainly, but not actually performed in St Petersburg during Catherine’s reign. The booklet writer claims that Berlioz introduced it to Russian audiences long after Gluck’s death. But David Cairns, in the second volume of his Berlioz biography, Servitude and Greatness, 1832-1869, notes that although excerpts from Armide were planned as part of his six-concert St Petersburg programme, they were substituted by Act 1 of Alceste. Berlioz certainly championed Gluck’s operas though, writing to his niece, Joséphine Chapot, ‘What a joy to introduce a people to works of such beauty! The Russians do not know Gluck!’

Gauvin’s Gluck is particularly classy, especially the Act 2 recitative and aria ‘Ah! Quelle cruauté de lui ravir le jour!’, supported by the piquant winds of the Pacific Baroque Orchestra. There is plenty of bite to her soprano and a slight threat that it might just run off the rails in more frenzied moments of ‘Le perfide Renaud me fuit’ (a good thing), where the horns and timpani thunder forcefully. These moments of aggression are welcome as, apart from an injection of vigour in Yevstigney Ipatyevich Fomin’s overture to Les cochers au relais, most of the works have a more relaxed air. There’s certainly nothing to match Bartoli’s spitfire Russian in Raupach’s ‘Razverzi pyos gortani, laya’, which still rattles me nearly six years on. Indeed, it’s a shame there’s no Russian heard at all here. Even the promisingly titled Sinfonia Cossaca by Domenico Dall’Oglio is dressed in polite court manners, with barely a whiff of stroganoff.

Of the vocal music by the Russians, Berezovsky’s is the more interesting, with two well-crafted arias from Demofoonte. Bortnyansky, best known as a prolific choral composer, is represented by music from Alcide and a French opéra comique, Le faucon. The Pacific Baroque Orchestra under Alexander Weimann are sensitive partners, the flutes especially buttery. There’s much to enjoy here, but don’t come expecting the revelations that Bartoli uncovered.