The Barber of Seville/English National Opera, Coliseum, ENO <br></br>Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra/Blomstedt, Barbican Hall, London

The singing is great. If only they had a part for Bugs Bunny

After years of hedging my bets, I've come to the conclusion that you're either for or against Rossini. A truly scintillating production might win you over for one night – in much the same way as a great bottle of wine might briefly convince you that your DIY-obsessed neighbour is the world's greatest raconteur – but is there anything more to these waspish little satires than a load of old roulades? Does anyone ever sit down and listen to them in their entirety sans set, sans slapstick? Could anyone say, hand on heart, that they genuinely prefer the whole of The Barber of Seville in a less than sparkling production to the Bugs Bunny cartoon of its overture?

Well, if a near-capacity audience at the second night of the eighth – yes, eighth – revival of English National Opera's merely petillant 1987 Barber of Seville is anything to go by, plenty of people do. But are they all Rossini fanatics? No, a fair few of them will be opera-lovers keen to see new vocal talent, of which, in a cast largely composed of singers from the company's own apprenticeship programme, there is plenty.

The most eagerly awaited debut here is that of Jonathan Lemalu; a bass-baritone whose student appearances at the Royal College of Music generated a buzz beyond hype. With a voice like slow-melted chocolate, impeccable diction, stylish phrasing, and a characterisation the sublety and depth of which go beyond the flat physical comedy of William Relton's revival of Jonathan Miller's prissy middle-England original, Lemalu's Don Basilio is transformed from supporting to starring role.

His is not the only exciting debut. Victoria Simmonds, last seen as an outrageously sexy Cherubino in Steven Stead's sci-fi Figaro, is an enchanting Rosina, all glittery top-notes, bubbling fioritura, flirty baby-blues and swishy hips. Leslie John Flanagan, last season's excellent Schaunard, makes an easy transition from "best friend" to leading man, with an attractive, confident Figaro, leaving Toby Stafford-Allen to step into his old role with a toothsome translation of the slippery Fiorello.

With the exception of Colin Lee's diffident Almaviva, this is a cast any company promoting young singers would be proud of. So why are they given so little help? In the pit, conductor Alex Ingram allows too much bluster from the brass, too many inaccuracies from the cellos, too much force in the patter sections and too much sag in the recitatives. By comparison with this, the clarinets and flutes seem as exotic and incongruous as truffle-shavings on a builder's breakfast. On stage there are problems too. If Miller's original conjured up the raised pinkies of a Home Counties tea party, Relton's reworking places inverted commas around it, as if to distance himself, his actors and us from this chocolate-box picture of 18th-century Spain. (The FCUK-style postersin no way resemble this period-costume production.) Outside of Andrew Shore's pantomime misanthrope Bartolo, humour hangs on a series of running visual gags and a light dusting of smut. Too often the actors are left with nothing to do but mug or shrug in reaction to a six-minute aria, and Simmonds's dramatic function is reduced to that of a sit-com soubrette.

How much of this is down to Rossini? Clearly his music is not empty-headed, nor does he discriminate between the sexes in the narrative. There's a fine vein of subversive satire throughout Rossini's operas but, as Moshe Leiser and Patrice Caurier proved in their Covent Garden Cenerentola, this must be carefully identified. Despite Amanda and Anthony Holden's witty translation, that crucial thread of subversion is absent, leaving little of interest beyond some pretty tunes, prettily sung.

There you have it: a superb debut from Simmonds, smart support from Flanagan and Stafford-Allen, some delicious playing from the woodwind, and Lemalu, a singer who, in a world where faddish crazes for record-company favourites too often obscure the greater artistry of their peers, lives up to his pre-publicity. Enough of a reason to see this Barber? Yes, but I still think The Rabbit of Seville has the edge.

The marvellous Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra rolled in last week for Leipzig Day at the Barbican. Leipzig Day? As Bach, Brahms, the Schumanns, Wagner and Mendelssohn all composed there, wouldn't Leipzig Week be more appropriate? Yes, but with a different conductor, for in Herbert Blomstedt's hands Leipzig Evening felt as long as a Leipzig Month: February.

After a beguiling scamper through Mendelssohn's concert overture Die Schöne Melusine – beautifully coloured by the orchestra's buttery woodwind and brilliant strings – and a stylish account of his delicate Second Piano Concerto – only slightly hampered by Alfredo Perl's over-heavy keyboard – expectations were very high for Blomstedt's Brahms. But instead of extending the lightness and energy of his Mendelssohn across the more impassioned territory of Brahms's First Symphony, Blomstedt encased the work in the kind of musical wet cement I associate with bad Bruckner. Airless, slow and utterly devoid of rubato, this Brahms was an inexplicable volte face from a conductor whose Mendelssohn was so scintillating.

a.picard@independent.co.uk

'The Barber of Seville': Coliseum, London WC2 (020 7632 8300) to 28 November