Even opera-buffs will recognise the genre of juke-box musical. Sir David Pountney has devised his own, from the musical works of Purcell, called Masque of Might. A mash-up of, predominantly, The Tempest, The Indian Queen, Ode for the Birthday of Queen Mary, and Ode for St Cecilia’s Day, it might be regarded as ‘woke’, Pountney having compiled a story about climate change, only, coincidentally, Purcell’s time had a bit of a climate crisis of its own. The masque works, thanks to the pathetic fallacy, God and his angels having wept for centuries and the earth crying out even in the Old Testament.

Described in the programme as ‘a collage of baroque and modern’, the performance opens with Nebulous and Elena in rich, creamy baroque costume as a modern-dress ‘baby’ is born. He turns out to be Diktat, a tyrant with a purely coincidental resemblance to a certain Great Power leader, who has closed his mind to climate change. He has a couple of sycophants – Tousel Blond and Ginger Strumpet, in matching red and orange suits, respectively, and clown-face. The chorus, dressed in black – three-quarter-length ‘lab’ coats over pleated skirts or trousers – also wear clown-face and are (amongst others) prisoners with labels like ‘Insurrectionist’ and ‘Rebel’ hung round their necks, trees with vivid green twiggy gloves and headdresses, and cheerleaders with pom-poms.

All the action takes place before David Haneke’s lively video back-cloth – of space, with planets, grainy footage of collapsing glaciers and falling forests, a rather glamourous, golden hall of mirrors with chandeliers which disconcertingly start moving around the ceiling, a ‘living’ portrait of Diktat sometimes in white tux, and a restful, static forest view of vivid green.

Needless to say, Diktat eventually realises the error of his ways, and the earth is saved. Along the way there is some excellent singing, dancing and acting, including an excellent a cappella Hear my prayer from the chorus. In the pit, the Opera North orchestra, conducted by Harry Bickett, is augmented by baroque specialists on theorbo, and recorders instead of flutes, particularly noticeable in Hark! Each tree.

As Elena, Anna Dennis is superb, O let me ever, ever weep exquisite, accompanied by violin and continuo. She also doubles as the Witch of Endor in a striking hat by costume-designer Marie-Jeanne Lecca. Andri Björn Róbertsson as Nebulous has an early death, but comes back first as an Activist with ginger dreadlocks and then as Wolf.

As well as being given to macho posturing – bare-chested gratuitous boar-killing, for example – and some self-doubt (consulting Xavier Hetherington’s Seer who wears a scarlet turban with matching large ostrich feather) Callum Thorpe’s Diktat is strongly sung. His last aria before wrapping himself in a blanket and turning his face to the wall is a stand out. His sycophants (James Laing and James Hall), having seen the errors of their ways, join the other side. Throughout, they are an entertaining double-act.

Despite the climate-change message, this performance never feels like agit-prop or propaganda. It feels like an everyday well-constructed goodies v baddies opera where, as in the best of all possible worlds, the goodies win yet again.