It's not often that you see a horsebox and a donkey conveyance parked outside the New Theatre. But Ellen Kent, that indefatigable importer of Eastern European opera and ballet companies, also loves animals. So in her production of Carmen, a donkey appears in Lillas Pastia's tavern, and a magnificent horse carries bullfighter Escamillo as he makes his grand entrance to the sound of March of the Toreadors. On the human side, Ms Kent also provides four Spanish dancers to entertain the punters in the tavern. In this production, incidentally, Lillas Pastia himself is a very jolly mine host, as opposed to the surly "I've got my licence to consider" character you sometimes encounter.

So it's all very cheesy, is it? Actually no, Ellen Kent (who also directs) provides a generally traditional, straightforward production, which allows Bizet's music, and Meilhac and Halévy's libretto to speak for themselves.

Any production of Carmen is dependent on the singing -and, equally important, acting - ability of the person playing the title role, and here Heather Shipp has much going for her. Her provocative, sexy body language transmits strongly across the footlights - it's no wonder that her besotted follower Don José (Irakli Grigali, giving an excellent impression of an amiable wimp) rapidly finds himself out of his depth. Vocally, Shipp slides effortlessly from high drama at the top of her range to expressively wanton sounds at the bottom. But in the performance I saw, she seemed curiously low wattage at times, then came on at full power - her aria En vain pour éviter, in which the cards forecast Carmen's death, was as chilling as I've ever heard it. Crowd scenes - the vicious fight outside the cigarette factory for instance - similarly sometimes went flat, while elsewhere the Chisinau National Chorus sung with sustained gusto. The Oxford performances came at the conclusion of a long tour, and I wonder if a little tiredness had crept in.

But there was plenty to enjoy and tug at the heartstrings nonetheless, not least from Irina Vinogradova's captivating Michaela, and Petru Racovita's robust, self-admiring Escamillo. Deservedly, this production was greeted with sustained applause at the end.