o use panto terminology, there were two goodies and a baddie in this Bampton Classical Players concert. The goodies were the composer Vivaldi and a selection of his operatic arias. The baddie was the weather - St Mary's Church was freezing, with the performers having only a single electric fire to keep their fingers supple. But to be fair, the parishioners have bigger things to worry about than the heating: some £350,000 has to be found by next August to replace the roof, otherwise this beautiful church will have to close.

This was an all-Vivaldi concert, with the familiar Four Seasons framing vocal contributions. In the first half, soprano Gilly French sang Laudate pueri, a nine-movement setting of Psalm 113 Praise the Lord, ye servants. In the cold, this was an unlucky choice, with the voice having to cover two octaves, and much of the music lying high. It would have been a test in ideal conditions, and French had a heroic crack at it.

In the second half, mezzo Serena Kay (a Bampton Opera regular) delivered arias from four different Vivaldi operas with tremendous zest and style - dressed in a red leather jacket zipped up to keep her throat warm, she seemed entirely unaffected by the temperature. Ranging from La fida ninfa, a pastoral drama featuring nymphs, shepherds, and pirates to Juditha triumphans, an allegory of confrontation between the Venetians and Turks, the arias sung made you long to hear more of Vivaldi's operatic music.

Helpfully, texts were provided of the sonnets Vivaldi wrote to accompany each of the Four Seasons - even though the music itself is highly descriptive and programmatic, the words provide added insight. In their performance, the Bampton Players (led be Camilla Scarlett, pictured) emphasised that Vivaldi's seasons are often less genial than Haydn's - for instance, Vivaldi's Summer buzzes with gnats and flies. Not surprisingly, the steely string disharmonies at the start of Winter were played with memorable feeling.