To say that I enjoyed the current production of the Canadian Opera Company's (COC) production of Madama Butterfly may be taken as an understatement. With only two minor complaints, this is a wonderful production that deserved the standing ovation it received the night I attended its performance.

The music, of course, is sublimely romantic, and the COC Orchestra under the baton of Maestro Carlo Montanaro shone. He is a man, who understands Puccini. The orchestra allowed the singers to soar above it, although at the very beginning it drowned the interaction between the marriage broker, Goro (tenor Steven Cole), and Lt. Pinkerton (tenor David Pomeroy). But it lasted just minutes and then things settled down to the balance needed between voice and instruments with often glorious results.

Susan Benson's set and costume, though minimal in concept, fully evoked the atmosphere of the opera and its turn-of-the-century setting (the opera premiered in 1904) in what Westerners perceive as Japan in the Edwardian period. Delicate pastels set off by muted grays for the costumes, moveable screens to indicate a simple Japanese home, and a backdrop of the countryside around Nagasaki with its gentle mountainous region set the tone. What made the costumes so special despite their minimal interpretation is that they moved so easily, acting as a metaphor for the name of its heroin, Butterfly.

The lighting truly complemented this setting. Michael Whitfield literally painted the scenes for us with his lights and he never placed them in such a way that the various characters became indistinct as so often is the case lately in theater productions. His conception of the change from Act II to Act III, as day turns to night and then to morning again, is a simple thing of beauty.

One felt a little sad for two thirty-ish-something women sitting within earshot, who grumbled about the lack of a little footbridge in a garden and other Japanese clichés, including the cherry blossom trees that were not visible here. They looked for a substantial Japanese house with lacquered furniture. No doubt, they had not the slightest notion that this story had a rather colorful background going back to a French author by the name of Julien Viaud, whose somewhat seedy play from 1887, Miss Chrysanthemum (O'kiku-San), offered a far less delicate creature than Cho-Cho-San (Madama Butterfly). His French navel officer had two ambitions, one to have a tattoo and the other to buy a temporary wife, a common practice in Japanese ports in the 19^th century. One doubts that these sailors and their temporary wives lived in houses with gardens that had footbridges and expensive furniture.

Madame Butterfly then appeared in a short story by American lawyer/writer John Luther Long published in 1898 in the now defunct Century Magazine. He based his story on recollections by his sister, Jennie Correll, who had been to Japan with her husband, a Methodist missionary. The Japan of his imagination, too, offered few riches.

The Long story, in turn, inspired the American impresario and director David Belasco to write his play, Madam Butterfly, which he took to London in 1900. There it came to the attention of Puccini. The composer turned to librettists Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica, who can be credited with the entire first act of the opera, although the opera had considerable birth pains.

Benson and stage director Brian Macdonald held to the original Edwardian setting of Madama Butterfly instead of bringing it forward to our own time. This COC production, first presented by the company in 1990 and repeated in 2003 is all the better for it. It has held up well in this 2009 staging.

Tenor Pomeroy fits the part of the rather careless Lt. Pinkerton, who too late realizes that Cho-Cho-San (soprano Adina Nitescu) has taken the marriage serious. The Romanian singer in her debut with the COC offers a stellar performance as the jilted Cho-Cho-San. Her voice alternates between velvety and steely tones to express the innocence as well as the determination of the young girl-made-woman.

Mezzo soprano Allyson McHardy, well known to COC audiences from other COC productions, has a rich, well-modulated voice. She gives a well-rounded performance as Suzuki, Cho-Cho-San's loyal servant.

Earlier I wrote of 'two minor complaints.' Well, there were moments, especially in Act I, when one wished that baritone James Westman were a bit more commanding as US Consul Sharpless. It might have made Pinkerton's careless attitude toward his warnings about the young woman's state of mind all the more important. As Sharpless, Westman comes across a little too jaunty at times though his voice, overall, has a warm, pleasing tone. The question, of course, arises: was this meek, jaunty style a directorial decision? This interpretation of the part failed, however, to diminish the total effect of the production.

As always, the chorus under Sandra Horst's direction, gave an excellent performance, as did all of the minor roles, too many here to mention.