Frank Matcham's masterly opera house is certainly getting a lively workout at this year's Buxton Festival. After the Teutonic whimsy of Lortzing's The Poacher on opening night, four more operatic rarities were staged on the next two evenings. True, Handel's Samson is neither rare nor an opera. But it's unlikely that this turbulent oratorio has been presented before as a gloss on modern-day Gaza, with the chorus required to quick-change from Zionist settlers into gun-toting Palestinians, and Samson portrayed as an imprisoned terrorist - a “suicide bomber” who uses his strength as his explosive.

Clever concept, on paper. But Daniel Slater's production turned out to be a series of cheap shocks - of which the insertion of a clip from the 1949 Hollywood version of Samson and Delilah with Victor Mature and Hedy Lamarr was the most bizarre; and the shooting of a hostage in the back of the head was the most vicariously nasty. And Slater's ending, in which the warring sides suddenly decided to shake hands, was fatuous.

He also did the music few favours. Handel writes buoyant, sexy arias for Dalila. But this oppressive interpretation had no room for light relief, and Rebecca Bottone as Dalila seemed understandably confused as to whether her solos should be thrilling or sombre. The same went for Elin Manahan Thomas, required to sing the glorious, trumpet-led Let the Bright Seraphim as the blood-splattered survivor of a terrorist attack.

Pity, because elsewhere there was much to admire. Tom Randle was a muscular and convincingly hotheaded Samson; Russell Smythe sang beautifully as his bewailing dad. And Harry Christophers conducted some excellent period instrumentalists and a well-drilled chorus with style and intelligence.

Michael Barry did a more persuasive job the following evening, staging a triple bill of English 20th-century operas presented under Oliver Gooch's sympathetic musical direction. Vaughan Williams's J.M. Synge adaptation, Riders to the Sea, is more or less unmitigated Celtic gloom. It portrays a mother who has already lost four sons to the cruel sea, and loses a fifth as the opera unfolds. But when her lament is sung as powerfully as by Clare Shearer here, it radiates a haunting aura.

I was less gripped by Holst's sparse and ascetic Savitri, dolefully setting a Hindu tale about Death outwitted by a determined woman, with much mystical oohing from an offstage chorus - though Elizabeth Atherton was appealingly lyrical in the title role. But Holst's frisky, folksong-infused sex comedy, The Wandering Scholar - performed with terrific farcical verve by Hal Cazalet, Gail Pearson, Mark Richardson and Kevin Greenlaw - proved to be a spanking yarn, in every sense. I'm sure Max Mosley would have loved it.

Box office: 0845 1272190

Editor's choice

• U2 at Nou Camp Stadium, Barcelona
• The 50 Best Movie Villains
• The 15 golden rules of theatre etiquette