Some of the cream of the up-and-coming generation of opera singers was on display in the National Opera Studio showcase. With the Orchestra of Scottish Opera in the pit of the Theatre Royal, conducted by Wyn Davies, 12 young singers performed a series of operatic excerpts, largely but not entirely confined to Mozart. Don Giovanni, Cosi fan tutte, Idomeneo and Figaro were all present. So, too, was Donizetti's L'elisir d'amore, Massenet's Werther and Britten's Midsummer Night's Dream, which brought the programme into the twentieth century.

The standard on the National Opera Studios course is high, but there are always a couple of performances that stand out from the rest: here it was the soprano Katherine Broderick, winner of last year's Kathleen Ferrier award. Aside from the quality of her voice, what stands out about Broderick is her easy ability to inhabit the characters and make them believable. Having first appeared as a suitably mournful Donna Anna swearing vengeance on her father's murderer in the act one excerpt from Don Giovanni, she later returned as a delightfully girlish Fiordiligi; a young woman distraught at the prospect of her lover going off to war, but also, one sensed, enjoying playing up her moment of melodrama.

With minimal props and directorial intervention there's no space for wooden performances in these scenes, and the performers mercifully avoided the stock operatic cliches. Robert Gardiner made a strong impression as the peasant Nemorino in L'elisir while there was some spirited ensemble work from the quartet playing the hapless lovers in Britten's Midsummer Night's Dream.