On two consecutive nights this week I sat open-mouthed in admiration as a bunch of super-talented children confirmed that the future of live entertainment in this country is in safe hands.

The stars of tomorrow are also the stars of today in both the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Matilda and in The Sound of Music at the New Theatre.

Three teams take on the parts of the six junior members of the von Trapp family, whose militaristic home life under their whistle-blowing widowed father changes for the better through the benign influence of their new governess, the would-be nun Maria. (Liesl — too old to require a governess, she says — is portrayed only by Claire Fishenden). Let’s hear it for the sextet I saw: Ella Bartman, seven, as Greta; Isabella Harris-Johnstone, eight, as Marta; Zoe Dignan, nine, as Brigitta; Max Weitzman, nine, as Kurt; Maddie McCarthy, ten, as Louisa; and Sam Veck, 13, as Friedrich.

Of course, the biggest draw for most in the sparkling revival of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II’s 50-year-old musical is Connie Fisher as Maria. She won the part in BBC TV’s How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria? and went on to triumph in Andrew Lloyd Webber and David Ian’s production at the London Palladium. After more than four years in the role, she has said that the shows in Oxford will be her last. You have until January 2 to catch her superb performance.

Those who recall (and who doesn’t?) the defining account of the role supplied on celluloid by Julie Andrews will find that Connie looks and sounds very like her. Happily, her gentleness of demeanour is not the saccharine sweetness that some found cloying in Andrews, thereby sentencing the show to a reputation for sickly sentiment.

In fact, it is in many ways a tough-edged tale, especially as concerns the principled (and dangerous) objection to his country’s takeover by the Nazis of the aristocratic Austrian Captain Georg von Trapp (Michael Praed). This certainly contrasts with the equivocal political expediency of music promoter (and the show’s comic relief) Max (Martin Callaghan) and von Trapp’s fiancée Baroness Shraeder (Jacinta Mulcahy). The break-off of her engagement is partly a consequence of this difference, but mainly of his developing love for Maria. The scene of their break-up is a masterpiece of stage economy from writers Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse.

That Liesl (“Sixteen going on Seventeen” loses her love, the postboy Rolf (Chris Barton) has everything to do with his enthusiastic espousal of the Nazi cause.

Lovers of the show will find all as they would wish in the musical department, with musical director Jonathan Gill in charge of a 13-strong force in the pit. My Favourite Things, Do-Re-Mi, Edelweiss, The Lonely Goatherd, The Sound of Music itself — there are so many wonderful songs in this show. Best of all for me is Climb Ev’ry Mountain from the Mother Abbess (Marilyn Hill Smith). Director Jeremy Sams brings the curtain down on Act I with this as designers Robert Jones (set) and Mark Henderson (lighting) supply a tromp l’oeil visual effect that truly raises the spirits.

The sets are another ‘star’ of this high-quality entertainment, whisking us seamlessly from glorious Alpine scenery, to ancient candlelit cloisters and the airy luxury of the von Trapp estate.

This is a not-to-be missed Christmas treat.

Until January 2. Box office: 0844 847 1588 (www.newtheatreoxford.org.uk).