THE ORIGINAL production of Swanhunter was staged on a shoestring budget involving little more than polystyrene cut-outs to suggest ice floes.

Six years on, this Opera North revival with The Wrong Crowd, a company that brings together writers and puppeteers, is an inspired collaboration.

A family-oriented production based on the Finnish folk epic the Kalevala, it magically brings to life the heroic adventure of Lemminkainen who travels to the north to find a bride who “makes the sun sigh and the moon ache.”

But before he can do so, he has to hunt the Devil’s elk, ride his horse and shoot the swan that lives on Death’s river.

Yet the drama of the staging and Alasdair Middleton’s libretto is unfortunately not always sustained by Jonathan Dove’s music.

Written for six instruments and six voices, the jazzy double-bass lines and wheezing accordion are sometimes too subtle to sustain interest among younger members of the audience.

This is despite an especially strong performance from Ann Taylor as the hero’s mother, whose repeated laments as she awaits his return are beautifully raw and a memorable turn by Suzanne Shakespeare as the swan, a multilayered creation with hinged legs and unfurling wings.

Producing an opera specifically for children is praiseworthy yet, despite its glorious staging, Swanhunter never quite takes flight.

Tours until May 3, details: operanorth.co.uk