[Degout] gives one of his greatest performances here, marvellously sung and acted...it’s an extraordinary achievement. Devieilhe makes an outstanding Ophélie, touching and vulnerable, her coloratura dazzlingly precise but never vacuously showy...Langrée really knows how to make this music live and breathe, and the playing, choral singing and recorded sound are all exemplary...Buy it and watch it, above all for Degout, who is unmissable and unforgettable.

In this exemplary staging, offering the highest musical standards, and with an all-French cast presenting the text with authority and seriousness, it registers as nothing short of a masterpiece…Testé and the singers draw a network of complex but increasingly fractured relationships between the central characters, each one of them sung with complete technical command and presented with purpose and conviction.

a strong piece worthy of further revival. Cyril Teste’s modern-dress production is simple and elegant and imaginatively captured for the screen by François Roussillon. Conductor Louis Langrée brings a freshness and buoyancy to the score, so although the mood is sombre there is a welcome delicacy of touch. Stéphane Degout excels as Hamlet, brooding and sarcastic, his baritone lithe and flexible.