Financial constraints can usually focus the mind wonderfully and that is certainly the case in Michael Barry’s sensible, uncluttered production of Mozart’s The Magic Flute as this year’s Birmingham Conservatoire main opera.

There is no opportunity for directorial extravagance here (not that Barry can ever be accused of that), but a simple emphasis on plot and character, aided by Colin Judge’s effectively symbolic designs and John Bishop’s resourceful lighting.

The whole feel is one of the 1930s, inspired perhaps by the interest in all things Egyptian during the art deco period: the opera, after all, is set in an Egypt where the ideals of Freemasonry developed. So the main characters were dressed like people in a Poirot novel (and the Three Boys like Nigel Molesworths in prep school), while the priests and Sarastro, their leader, looked as though they had stepped out of a decorative frieze.

This made for an effective transition between the pantomime atmosphere with which the work begins and the preachy, idealistic polemic it later becomes and though at first disconcerting, the decision to have the extensive spoken dialogue (largely convincingly delivered) given in English rather than the German of the sung numbers helped the conception.

In a strong company cast, it is unfair to single out candidates for special praise, but the Pamina of Hannah Davey (I saw the first of a double cast) was particularly delightful, complemented by Ben Gillham’s suave Tamino. Karmen Bodi made an heroic job of the Queen of the Night’s stratospheric ravings and Anders Falbe was a likeable Papageno.

Stephen Barlow conducted a tidy, enthusiastic orchestra and the choral sound was sonorous and thrilling.