This is one of the most beautiful Strauss performances you will ever hear. It is played with rich precision and, for the most part, gloriously sung. Whether it gets to the heart of the work, however, is open to dispute.

Written in 1937, Daphne has been described as the most lyrical of Strauss's stage works, though it has a dark side, which interpreters ignore at their peril. The myth of Daphne, who was transformed by the gods into a laurel tree to escape the sexual attentions of Apollo, is reworked in the opera, so that it plays out during a feast of Dionysus, the god of irrational emotion. Dionysus never appears on stage, although his music begins to permeate the score minutes from the opening, as lurching strings and whip cracks, at once erotic and sinister, intrude on the woodwind serenity of the prelude.

The problem in this performance is that the sense of Dionysiac danger - of unspoken emotions out of control - is played down. The conductor, Stefan Soltesz (replacing Christian Thielemann), shades the score towards a serene sameness of tone. The equivocal orchestral meandering that marks the climax of Apollo's attempted seduction of Daphne is curiously sedate. The erratic throbs that accompany the Dionysiac feast - at which Daphne finds herself drawn to another woman, who proves to be her male childhood playmate Leukippos in disguise - are robbed of their incipient violence.

Daphne is played by Alexandra von der Weth as a mythic creature, half-human, half-divine. Floating Strauss's taxing lines with almost supernatural ease, her voice, at once sexual and chaste, seems disembodied, as if she has already half passed beyond the world of men and gods that would exploit and destroy her. It is a great performance. Her Apollo is Johan Botha, unprepossessing in appearance, but vocally tireless, beautiful and virile. Roberto Sacca's Leukippos, on the other hand, is a shade effortful and a fraction too aggressive for an ambivalent character whose psychology and sexuality hover between masculinity and femininity. Jane Henschel, as Daphne's mother Gaea, sculpts her cavernous phrases with tremendous majesty. Only the bass, Alfred Reiter, as Daphne's father Peneios, is inadequate: out of tune in some places, inaudible in others. Despite the flaws, this is a major achievement.

· Further performance on Wednesday. Box office: 020-7304 4000. Daphne will be broadcast on Radio 3 on May 18.