This most humane and intimate of all Wagner’s operas is a natural for DVD, but we haven’t yet had an entirely satisfactory version. ArtHaus’s Munich performance is luminously conducted by Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, but with a rather sterile quasi-Victorian staging and Wolfgang Brendel’s bland, lightweight Sachs. Sir Charles Mackerras’s Australian version has a decent staging and a fine if rough-hewn Sachs in Sir Donald McIntyre, but a less good supporting cast and recording. Horst Stein’s Bayreuth recording from 1984, with Siegfried Jerusalem, Marianne Häggander, Hermann Prey and Bernd Weikl’s youthful Sachs, has yet to reach DVD. This new Met version, superbly recorded (in widescreen, despite the cover) and boasting an even more mouthwatering cast, raises considerable expectations, therefore. And largely fulfils them.

Conducting and staging are solidly uncontroversial. Levine’s rich, weighty Wagner style seems to suit Meistersinger better than The Ring. There are still some unexpected gear changes, but better integrated into a fluent, warm reading, luxuriating in the Met’s orchestral sound. Like his Met Ring, Otto Schenk’s production is almost aggressively traditional – lively enough, but one longs for some subtler spark of originality or insight, in the sets especially. A properly bustling Act 3 ‘Festweise’ is welcome, instead of dull grandstands, but the Act 2 brawl is sadly shirked.

The singers are undoubtedly the best on DVD. With his clear, unbaritonal lyric Heldentenor, Ben Heppner is the most convincingly poetic Walther on DVD; but the bulky face and frame that would just about pass from the auditorium lose all credibility in Brian Large’s vivid camera direction. Even the beautiful Karita Mattila’s girlish antics look less appropriate, but she remains a stunning Eva, dramatic in power but with reserves of crystalline lyricism, exceptional in her Act 3 outburst and the Quintet.

René Pape’s Pogner, strangely lacking make-up, absurdly looks no older than his ‘daughter’ – a minor blemish on such a finely resonant performance, but another blow to dramatic involvement. Matthew Polenzani’s plump David sings appealingly but can’t match Graham Clark’s quicksilver Bayreuth characterisation; however, he and Jill Groves’ robust Magdalene make their relationship reasonably credible. Sir Thomas Allen’s minutely characterised, acidulous Beckmesser is properly malevolent yet unexpectedly mellifluous, hilarious without vocal distortions.

James Morris’s Sachs is in line with Levine – not the most charismatic cobbler-poet, but warm-hearted, quintessentially American and none the worse for that. His voice is more sinewy now and less steady, losing some of its rich tone and silken legato, but gaining in character. He’s still not ideally expressive, though, making less of the cobbler-poet’s visionary and temperamental side, and more telling as Eva and Walther’s genial mentor than in the monologues. His fellow Mastersingers are well portrayed, though John Del Carlo could make more of Kothner, but the chorus and apprentices can’t quite match Bayreuth’s.

Stein’s version, if it appears, will only offer a slightly more adventurous alternative. This amiable, large-scale performance will remain highly recommendable.