Edition de Sylvie Boissou, Benoît Dratwicki, Julien Dubruque
Coédition Centre de musique baroque de Versailles, Société Jean-Philippe Rameau, Bärenreiter-Verlag
BA9192, 2015.
182pp, £38.50
(Also Airs d’opéra: Tenor – vol. 2; BA9197, 2015. 152pp, £38.50)
[dropcap]T[/dropcap]here are 28 items in the soprano selection and 21 for the tenors; this is good value for study and learning the vocal parts, and the print is quite clear enough for practical use. I suspect the piano will be used more than the harpsichord. However, the publisher should make scores and parts available for each aria as required; serious learners of this repertoire and style will want to move from keyboard accompaniment to the full orchestral texture. The layout is excellent, and the first page of each item has the title and then introductions and the text in both French and English. It is slightly disppointing that there is no difference in the price of two books, one of which has 30 fewer pages.
BClifford Bartlett