Every now and then a disc comes along that paralyses the critical faculties: you know you should be trying to be objective, but somehow cold analysis seems almost obscene. So it is here. My only dip into obscenity would be to warn that, for some tastes, Sophie Marin-Degor’s soprano may seem a little shrill at forte in the higher reaches. But then French sopranos have been taxed with this since forever, and I think we have to accept that it goes with the territory.

In all other respects that territory, as explored here, is the land where the oranges bloom; or, if you prefer, ‘l’île heureuse’. Both Marin-Degor and Claire Brua come to this repertory from the world of Baroque music, and they bring with them a cleanness of articulation and phrasing that is wholly delightful, sensitively and tactfully supported by Serge Cyferstein. Apart from the sheer sonorous pleasure of the disc, I admire unreservedly the balance all three artists maintain between expressive moment and formal shaping: key words come over with just a little emphasis, but not so much that we are aware of some vocal coach in the background saying ‘Bring out the verb here!’ Similarly, rhythms are accurately observed, and delicate rubato reserved by and large for cadences.

I enjoyed this disc more than any for a long time. Stylish, responsive, impeccable in ensemble and tuning, sensuous, witty, moving…(that’s enough epithets). As for its absolute Frenchness, nothing speaks of it more than the labelling of the text of Mignon as the unaided work of Louis Gallet. Goethe, who he?