Iam not what you would call a connoisseur of opera. Folk, rock and blues are more up my street.

It was fortunate, then, that all those genres were combined in Humphrey ‘Huck’ Astley’s new operetta, Alexander The Great.

Last Thursday, I meandered my way down to Oxford’s Old Fire Station, not quite knowing what to expect, but was pleasantly surprised by a production which was nothing short of brilliant.

Raw and powerful, Alexander The Great is an impressive display of visual flair and mesmerising songwriting.

I have seen opera before and, let me be clear: this was much more exciting.

Broken up into three acts, it follows a Texan teenager who falls in love with another teenager — a half- American Indian boy called Johnny — a cardinal sin in the eyes of his God-fearing, Bible-toting father, who follows the pair both mentally and physically throughout the tale.

They flee Texas for New Orleans and tear through the city in a trail of booze, drugs and sexual discovery. (It is not what you might call pious, to put it mildly.) It was, Huck says, inspired partly by his experiences of touring America for six weeks.

The music accompanying the acts starts folky and get progressively more into rock ‘n’ roll before descending into blues. It then gets moodier, before flaring into one final, excellent crescendo of joy.

I preferred the first two acts and cared less for the slower pace in the third, but there can be no criticism of Huck’s Xander Band, who are all skilled in their craft and, of course, the haunting but defiantly voiced Huck, who remained on top form throughout. The success of the spellbinding show, it has to be said, also owes to the fantastic visuals accompanying it. Often cool, sometimes bizarre, but never dull, I was reliably informed afterwards that almost all were shot specially for it in the States.

One surprise was the mid-cut to a narrated section which, although a bit of a cheat for an opera, was nonetheless helpful; Astley’s lyrics are sometimes easy to miss, so the explanation grounded me back in the story at a point where I had started to miss some connections.

I like what this story says to us, and that it doesn’t end how you necessarily want it to. What I liked most though, is that I wanted more!

What I want to say is ‘go and see this’. I am, however, in the unusual position of having nowhere to tell you to see it; the band having not yet confirmed their next performance, partly due to the cost of staging the production.

A Kickstarter campaign is set to begin though, and the first act is free to listen to online — go to huckandxander.bandcamp.com