Monday evening. We settle into our seats at around 6.45pm. This is the first night of the Royal Opera House's new season which is opening with a tried-and-tested production of Mozart's Don Giovanni. Thanks to a marketing stunt -- sorry, thanks to a bold initiative in audience development (and of course it's both), the punters at Covent Garden are all first-time attendees and readers of The Sun. The show is also the first from the house to be presented live in HD in arthouse cinemas across Europe and the United States. And (not being a regular purchaser of the aforesaid redtop) I'm with my family at the Clapham Picturehouse.

I have personal and professional interests in being here. I love the Metropolitan Opera shows that the Picturehouse and other cinemas have been taking for the past two seasons. Illuminations is also working as a production company to present other shows of this kind (so assess my comments below accordingly). Plus, if I was only allowed one opera on my desert island, Don Giovanni would almost certainly be my choice. So I'm really ready for this.

The one sentence description of what we get is an immaculate relay of an OK production with much wonderful singing and disappointing added extras. The show itself is beautifully presented by the cameras (marshalled by screen director Robin Lough). Apart from occasional "hotspots" when white costumes appear a touch too bright against the predominantly dark sets, and also some camera confusion in the ball scene, the images are gorgeous and the sound glorious. The stage director Francesca Zambello does an efficient job but the production isn't burdened with an excess of imagination or flair. (Don G climbing the set with a rope at the end of Act 1 is a startling exception, as is the brief nude tableau at the close.)

I was sceptical about whether Simon Keenlyside was right for Don Giovanni, but he's very strong, both seductive and a trifle seedy, and his voice is heavenly. As Donna Anna, Marina Poplavskaya has a throat infection so perhaps we can forgive her for being outsung by Joyce DiDonato's passionate Donna Elvira, but not for her sniffily dismissive glance at her curtain-call bouquet which is picked up by the unforgivingly detailed HD cameras. Zerlina (Miah Persson) is lovely too, but the star (and audience favourite) is Kyle Ketelsen as Leporello, who inhabits the role with warm subversive humour. Charles Mackerras conducts with a lifetime of experience.

Less than wonderful, however, is the ROH's packaging. This begins with an extended generic trailer for the company which bemusingly (given the occasion) concentrates more on ballet than opera. Plus, projected in HD on a big-screen, its standard definition images look a little fuzzy. Not the best of starts. And then the on-screen presentation of the broadcast is frankly scrappy.

Within seconds of host Antonio Pappano appearing, we've had a significant sound glitch and a brief loss of satellite signal. And on this showing Pappano should certainly stick to his day job as the ROH's music director (which he's just announced he's giving up in 2012). He's stiff and uncertain speaking to camera, and he only warms up in a live interval interview with Zambello. (Covent Garden's chief exec Tony Hall does an onstage welcome just after Pappano, and if the company is looking for someone to develop as London's answer to the Met's charismatic Peter Gelb, they could do worse than look to him.) Also in the interval we get another generic, and this time decidedly breathless, recorded tour around the different departments of Covent Garden, and an uneasy (also pre-recorded) encounter between Mackerras and Pappano in which both are reclining uncomfortably on a sofa.

But what we really miss are the backstage moments to which we've already become accustomed by the Met showings. There's no glimpse of the prompt corner and nothing to whet the appetite like the firm, Maestro Levine to the pit, please. No shots of the stage being re-set with the curtain down. No peaks into even a minor star's dressing-room. Indeed, the cameras stay firmly house-side. Perhaps this is the result of the company still feeling burned by the BBC's fly-on-the-wall documentary series, or perhaps it's because of union restrictions. The effect, however, suggests that for all that the house has tonight let in The Sun, it's still a rather closed and exclusive institution -- which I'm sure was far from the intended effect.

One footnote on the presentation at the Clapham Picturehouse: bravo to the staff there who did a great job, responding to the audience's requests just to bring the volume level down a touch, thoughtfully engaging with feedback and letting us know what other events are forthcoming. Plus the Sancerre is excellent too, if pricey -- a bit like a real-world visit to Covent Garden.

Related posts: Live from the Met [26 February 2007]

(Marketing montage image © Covent Garden)