How extraordinary, when you think about it, is Guillaume Tell in the career of Gioacchino Rossini? At the age of 37, at the very height of his powers, he writes his longest, grandest, and probably his greatest French opera, only to then fall silent for decades except for a few naughty piano works and the odd bon mot. He must have known (or feared) that he could do no better and, listening to it all over again, his final opera is a very fine thing indeed.

This outing comes from the admirable and ambitious annual Rossini Festival in Pesaro, and if there’s one thing they invariably do well it’s pick a cast. I really can’t imagine a better sung bit of bel canto than this. Add to that a magnificently detailed reading of the score, plus a thoughtful production, and this is nigh on four hours of operatic heaven.

Graham Vick’s neatly politicised staging shifts the action from late medieval times to the Swiss ‘Downton Abbey’ era, focusing on the class oppression that was running its course round about then rather than on the stark nationalism of the original. Against a bleak, white set, the drama is played out effectively enough,...