Last year's Mendelssohn bicentenary unearthed very little opera, as there is very little to unearth. The Buxton festival gave a performance of Mendelssohn's only full-length stage work, Camacho's Wedding. Now the Ryedale festival has resurrected The Homecoming, a slender, 50-minute singspiel that has not been performed for more than 150 years.

Not even Mendelssohn wanted this piece made public – it was conceived in 1829, performed by family and friends for his parents' silver wedding anniversary. Mr and Mrs Mendelssohn were treated to a diverting cuckoo-in-the-nest tale about a mayor awaiting the return of a long-lost son, before two turn up at once. The imposter must be exposed, and a sprightly burst of faux-Mozartian ensembles seems the best way to go about it.

Director Joe Austin introduced the pastel colours and picket fences of 1950s suburban America, which seemed at odds with the provincial Germany referred to in John Warrack's new translation. But the musical presentation far surpassed the variable standards of Mendelssohn's original cast. Rebecca Hodgetts made a pleasingly pert, lyrically toned Lisbeth, with James Harrison and Daniel Joy presenting a fine comic axis as her rival suitors.

The Mendelssohn might have fared better if it hadn't been preceded in a double bill by a genuine masterpiece: Benjamin Britten's church parable, The Prodigal Son. Elizabeth Burgess's ensemble brilliantly articulated the strange, sonorous marriage of gamelan and plainchant. The Homecoming could barely hope to match this; but as anniversary presents go, it certainly beats a carriage clock.