Slow, sepulchral and strenuously symbolic, Debussy’s 1902 masterpiece has never exactly been the people’s choice in grand opera. For one thing, it draws out a very simple plot – infatuated prince frolics with wife of half-brother, who kills him – for three very sombre hours.

But if you see Pelléas et Mélisande only once, see this production. Stanislas Nordey’s staging, imported by the Royal Opera from Salzburg, has its pretentious moments. Yet in the main roles it also has three performers who sing wonderfully – colouring Debussy’s deceptively simple, one-note-per-syllable lines with consummate subtlety – and act with startling integrity.

Startling is the right word, too. Far from being the usual weepy victim of the brutish Golaud, the mesmerising Angelika Kirchschlager portrays Mélisande as an independent spirit, strong and manipulative, who is well aware of her disruptive effect on this desiccated dynasty. You get the feeling that she has done this before (after all, how did she acquire the crown that she chucks away when Golaud discovers her?).

And this sense of watching an eternally recurring, archetypal tragedy of adultery and revenge, rather than a drama rooted in a specific locale, is emphasised by the stage designs. Kirchschlager wears a blood-red dress while the royal family are dressed, or rather trapped, in absurd, white clown pantaloons. As she starts to cast her spell, so her red gradually infects the sombre blocks of Emmanuel Clolus’s set, which open like medieval triptychs.

In turn, their contents – dozens of reproductions of Golaud’s letter, or Mélisande herself pinned on the wall amid 38 other identical red dresses – also suggest that we are watching patterns of events that have been, and will be, played out again and again. Indeed, the headless, white-clad mannequins who spookily clutter the stage at the end could be all the luckless Pelléases who ever lived.

The cast’s brilliant acting reinforces this notion of people trapped in a preordained catastrophe. At first there is no eye contact, let alone physical contact, between them. It’s as if they are propelled by external force rather than inner urges.

Even in the famous balcony scene, as he wraps himself in Mélisande’s hair, Simon Keenlyside’s outstanding Pelléas seems more intent on unlocking his own psyche – striking a series of narcissistic ballet poses – than in making love to another person. Keenlyside’s singing is astonishing. In a part often taken by tenors, his baritone soars with glorious clarity and power.

Gerald Finlay’s Golaud is no less majestically sung, especially when his self-control snaps and he flings Mélisande around by her fateful tresses. The minor parts are admirably taken by Robert Lloyd (a sinister Arkel in black glasses), Catherine Wyn-Rogers and, especially, by the assured young treble George Longworth as Golaud’s traumatised son.

The icing on the cake is Simon Rattle’s conducting. Shimmeringly luminous, suggestive yet understated, and constantly ebbing and flowing, the orchestral sound-world he conjures seems to distil the essence of this hauntingly beautiful yet elusive opera.

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