At first it looked as if the fortunes of Erich Korngold’s magnum opus were going to go the same way as those of the England footballers. So many hopes riding on the big occasion, but were the London Philharmonic’s squad really up to the task? One hour in, and drift, even aimlessness were taking hold. Why has this opera languished for 80 years without a British performance? Partly because it requires a ballsy, no-holds-barred approach that we didn’t seem to be getting from the forces deployed.

Certainly they had a lot to battle against. In Heliane, think of Wagner with less philosophy, more sex and five times the percussion. Think of Puccini – particularly Turandot or Fanciulla del West – with quadruple the orchestration and ten times the verbosity. Hell, I even thought of spangly MGM chorus girls descending mirrored staircases in feather boas.

That’s not such a fatuous comparison. This was really Korngold’s last hurrah before he fled Europe to adapt his unashamedly Romantic idiom for Hollywood film scores. And while it might be wrong to say that all Korngold sounds like film music (it’s the other way round, say the Korngoldistas), what you do tend to get in Heliane is a disconnect between the text and the music: the score tingled, whooped and burst around us, but often offered sensation and effect rather than true emotional counterpoint to the deeply symbolic (and rather cumbersome) libretto. As a result, the basic plot – essentially, a metaphysical, post -Liebestod love triangle about a frigid Queen, a nasty King and a sexy, Christlike Stranger – started melting in the orgasmic haze. Given the eccentric decision to place the hard-pressed singers up on the choir stalls, behind the orchestra, and a curious lack of definition from Jurowski’s conducting, we started melting too.

But by Act II Jurowski was unbuttoning. Plot tensions – Heliane put on trial for adultery by Robert Tear’s excellently insidious Judge – finally surfaced. Legions of offstage brass piled in to add some sonic muscle to the soup of dreamy strings and syrupy celesta. And with this increasing confidence from the orchestra – three cheers for a trumpet section on superb form with daunting music – you succumbed to the sheer chutzpah of it all.

The singing, too, grew in power as we reached the redemptive finale. The chorus (the Europachorakademie) sang their socks off. Andreas Schmidt’s King finally started to project beyond gruff, bluff mannerisms. Michael Hendrick’s valiant Stranger came good where it really counted, when he implausibly came back to life and blasted the King off his throne. And while Patricia Racette’s soft-grained Heliane lacked something in vocal power, her sensitive, intelligent singing did offer a real emotional thread to cling on to. Eighty years on, not just a necessary premiere: at best, an intoxicating one.

Editor's choice

• The 100 Best Films of the Decade
• 70 facts you didn't know about Marvel
• The 50 Biggest Movies Of 2010