Samson lacks strength

Religion stuffed with sex in a French Orientalist sauce makes for a heady dish. If early audiences considered Saint-Saëns's only successful opera, Samson et Dalila, a touch blasphemous in its retelling of the Old Testament, opera houses now think nothing of staging this quintessentially Jewish tale on a Friday night.

Elijah Moshinsky's 1981 opulent production for the Royal Opera still works, thanks largely to Sidney Nolan's vivid combination of naturalistic - well, fairly, in a cardboardish way - sets and characteristically primitive drop-curtain images. Costumes, standard Bible-illustration issue, come in various shades of desert sand for the suffering Israelites, stylish crimsons and russets for the louche Philistines.

On paper, the soloists should have been top notch. The Argentinian José Cura, though lacking Domingo's heartfelt eloquence, now ranks as one of the world's top Samsons.

Large and muscular, he looks ready to topple any old temple and moves with the sass of one who knows as much. Unfortunately, his top notes cracked and crumbled too, though his remorseful Act III aria, when shorn and eyeless in Gaza he turns the mill, had real force.

The American Denyce Graves, an established Dalila, exudes seductive glamour. Playing the role while seven months pregnant added, in the context, a wanton frisson.

But too often her gravelly mezzo was drowned by the orchestra (who sounded superb), emerging abrasive and coarse-toned. After a shaky start, her hit number, Mon coeur s'ouvre à ta voix - basically meaning "give it to me now, then I'll cut your hair off" - warmed into ardour.

Not that you want a smooth Dalila. In this opera I would happily trade vocal perfection for the dramatic veracity both principals provided. Not everyone

would agree. They were cheered but not esctatically. The supporting cast, which included Tigran Martirossian as the mocking Abimelech and Bruno Caproni as a foxy High Priest, was sound.

The evening really belonged to the Swiss conductor Phillippe Jordan, who transformed orchestra and expanded chorus into stars. Some might call his spacious, shapely approach slow, but I found it ideal.

To be brisk and orderly in this voluptuous piece is like tidying Tarzan into suit and tie. The moment of betrayal was shocking, the Philistine's Bacchanale sufficiently orgiastic in David Bintley's obscure, animalistic dance direction. The programme also credits a choreologist who presumably could tell us what it all meant.

Tonight, then 18, 20, 23 and 25 March. Information: 020 7304 4000.

Samson et Dalila