Berio and Rossini; Pappano, DiDonato and Santa Cecilia: even the names of the composers and performers had the ring of bel canto poetry. As music director at both Covent Garden and Rome's Accademia di Santa Cecilia, Antonio Pappano knows his way around Italian bel canto, and gave Rossini's Stabat mater full operatic weight.

Two of the soloists were late replacements, which may explain a generalised approach to the Latin words, but Janice Watson and Colin Lee made up in passionate restraint what was missing in enunciation. The solo star was mezzo Joyce DiDonato, every consonant in place, every note cleanly etched. Her attention to text was matched by the Santa Cecilia chorus, coaxing one moment, vehement the next: the threatening tone of the final "Amens" brooked no argument.

Luciano Berio's 1968 Sinfonia is more about brains and wit, dredging through centuries of musical history with a broad, occasionally earthy humour that is very Sixties and utterly contemporary. Mysterious texts, some sung, some spoken, jostle with a delirious collage of musical styles, reshaped to Berio's will: the presiding deities are Mahler and Martin Luther King, with Samuel Beckett muttering mischievously from the sidelines.

Pappano and his orchestra were in fine form, revealing endless details that could have got lost in the Albert Hall although the Swingle Singers, even with amplification, sometimes got buried in the mix. Yet this was a performance with an epic sweep; perhaps only Pappano could make such a perfect match between Berio and Rossini.

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