Parsifal at Covent Garden

This could have been such a great production. The orchestra of the Royal Opera House, conducted by the returning Bernard Haitink, perhaps has never been better. Like a superb dinner where the last taste is as good as the first, every note of the score was played perfectly . The singing too was of the highest order. Not only could we delight in Sir John Tomlinson and Sir Willard White respectively reprising their roles of Gurnemanz and Klingsor; Petra Lang's singing as Kundry was faultless and (for me) rather delicious.

However, the staging is almost entirely dire. It was generally awful when this production was first mounted at Covent Garden, back in 2001. I have cringed for six years with the memory. One hoped the eccentricities and the gimmicks would have been discarded in the meantime. Indeed the original set designer, I learned, had passed away since 2001 and so surely no one could have really minded.

But no: there it was - the large shark was again suspended from the ceiling in Act II. The accompanying garish neon lights reminded my girlfriend of a Scissor Sisters pop video. Then, even worse, Act III took place on the cheap astroturf that teletubbies frolic on. Cotton wool was stuck on to a green plastic box.

None of this is challenging or provocative; it is just crap. And it is offensive to those who pay the high prices to attend. Even Parsifal's costume was needlessly silly - a character whose utter innocence must be compelling to the audience and cast was dressed in flimsy green pyjamas that Primark would not sell.

And, almost inevitably, there was no drama. The story plodded on. Parsifal was just the same all the way through. The knights all looked bored in Act I as they sat at their long table, not at all engaged in the crucial arguments of the principals. Less interested were the flowermaidens. None of these supposed temptresses bothered to make eye-contact with their prey Parsifal; the girls of Castle Anthrax would have been far preferable. Whoever is responsible for the basic dramatic direction of this performance simply did not do a good job.

Why do the designers and directors bother? I know Wagner wrote drama as well as the music and words; but if designers and directors are not up to their material, to keep mounting full performances because that is what Wagner intended is misconceived.

Billy Budd at the Barbican

Some opera is best semi-staged or even in concert performance. Saved, that is, from "conceptual" set designers, moody lighting and crap direction. I would go so far to say that, unless there are compelling reasons to the contrary, any opera with any emotional depth should be on a bare stage, with the singers in blank costumes.

The best British Ring of recent years was the semi-staged version by the Royal Opera whilst it was cast out of Covent Garden a few years back. Wagner is powerful by the singing and music alone. Silly costumes, gimmick props and deep dark spaces are too much, and they detract rather than substantiate. Fully staged opera normally should be left to the jolly Italian works, which are not too far from pantomimes in any case.

Benjamin Britten's operas also suffer from poor full productions. The operas are usually sad and contain genuine moral confusion. Give such stuff to an ambitious director and an over-educated designer and the result is just painful. I sat though an awful Peter Grimes once, two hours of relentless bad lighting, wishing it was not in English and waiting for it to end.

In contrast, Billy Budd at the Barbican last Friday was a triumph. The singers, all male of course, faced out from the stage, dressed mainly in simple black costumes. The central concern of the opera - abuse of power and its aftermath - came clearly over to the engrossed audience.

The dithering and polite ship captain - the brilliant tenor Ian Bostridge - was convincingly both proper and awkward. But it was the bully Claggart - a charismatic Gidon Saks - and the bullied but attractive Billy Budd - a flirtatious Nathan Gunn - who conveyed the crisis of the opera with a few almost instinctive gestures and emphatic singing. In particular, Nathan Gunn's Billy Budd managed to do more with a couple of sideways smiles at Claggart than I can remember many opera companies doing over an entire evening.

I accept both Britten and Wagner should have fully staged productions every so often, just as it is nice for all the peers to get dressed up for the annual State Opening, but until directors and designers come along equal to their material, we should trust the music, the words, and the instincts of the singers.