Tag: Opera

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Grétry: L’amant jaloux (instrumental arrangement)

CD cover Gretry L'amant jaloux Notturna Christopher Palameta

Notturna, Christopher Palameta
56:42
Atma Classique ACD2 2797
+Entr’acte from “La Caravane du Caire”, F-A Danican Philidor oboe quartet no. 2

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Composed in the late 18th century for the court of Louis XV, Grétry’s three-act opera L’Amant Jaloux was an immediate and enormous success, and in the manner of the times, this anonymous instrumental arrangement of the main musical items for flute, oboe, violin, viola and bass appeared almost at once, to allow amateur musicians to enjoy all the hit tunes at home. The style of the writing is lightly Galant, and the instrumental version permits the enjoyment of Grétry’s ready musical imagination without having to follow the vagaries of a late-18th-century plot! Some of the musical items in the chamber score, made available for this recording by Brian Clark of Prima la Musica, are extremely short, but all of them have an elegant charm, which perfectly evokes the French court just prior to the revolution. The balance of the CD is made up with a delightful quartet for oboe, two violins and bass by François-André Danican Philidor, which in its intensity adds a darker element to the programme. The CD concludes with the Entr’acte from Grétry’s La Caravane du Caire in an arrangement for piccolo, flute, oboe, two violins, viola, horn, and bass. It is a remarkable thought that this charmingly innocent music was composed in 1783, virtually on the eve of the revolution which would sweep its whole world away. The playing of Notturna under the direction of Christopher Palameta is wonderfully idiomatic and expressive, vividly evoking the lost world of this insouciant repertoire.

D. James Ross

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Lully: Cadmus & Hermione

CD cover Lully Cadmus et Hermione Dumestre.jpg

Le Poème Harmonique – Ensemble Aedes, Vincent Dumestre
122:18 (2 CDs and a libretto in a cardboard wallet)
Château de Versailles Spectacles CVS037

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This was Lully’s first tragédie-en-musique. The libretto and, indeed, the new genre caused a certain amount of outrage among traditional dramatists but the mould had been broken and a new one created. This ‘studio-style’ recording was made in the opera house at Versailles which facilitates some doubling-up of the smaller parts, though this is of no great consequence. The artists are supported by a lavish booklet (essays in French, English and German, libretto in only French and English), though there are some minor typographical errors).

The solo singing is all very good, with well-paced recitative and well-defined emotions. I was less comfortable with the chorus, where the top line is not always as coherent as one might wish. But it is the instrumental contribution that I find disappointing, though others may think it wonderful. As is his habit, this conductor cannot resist fiddling with the instrumentation. The wind scoring is over-elaborated, and I doubt that Lully ever heard recorders at this pitch, let alone used them; I feel that the continuo is over-scored; and I also doubt the need for the percussion contributions.

When so much is so good it is a shame that these irritations occur. Cadmus is a fine work, and does not need this dressing-up.

David Hansell

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Avondano: Il mondo della luna

Avondano Il mondo nella luna

Fernando Guimarães tenor, Luis Rodrigues bass, Susana Gaspar soprano, et al
Os Músicos do Tejo directed by Marcos Magalhães
137:17 (2 CDs)
Naxos 8.660487-88

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During the first half of the 18th century, opera in Portugal pursued a somewhat fitful course, a mixture of local genres such as zarzuela and the Italian opera that swept Europe during the latter half of the previous century. Only after 1750, with the accession of the opera-mad King José I, was there a truly flourishing operatic scene in Portugal, though that was severely disrupted by the Lisbon earthquake of 1755, which destroyed the recently built Casa da Ópera just months after its inauguration.

Pedro António Avondano’s Il mondo della luna was given its first performance at another royal theatre, Salvaterra de Magos in 1765. Avondano was the son of an Italian violinist who had found employment in the lavishly appointed royal chapel of Jose I’s immediate predecessor, João V. He followed in his father’s footsteps, serving in the chapel between 1754 and 1782, writing both secular and sacred music. Il mondo della luna, based on a libretto by Carlo Goldoni first set by Galuppi in 1750 and subsequently by a number of composers including Haydn (1777), is his only opera. A three-act comic opera, it follows the usual format for a Goldoni opera of including a number of duets and, crucially, the act finales with continuous musical and often hectic dramatic development that the Venetian writer played such a large role in establishing as an essential component of opera buffa. All are employed in Il mondo, the plot of which concerns the efforts of the suitors of Clarice and Flaminia, the daughters of Buona Fede, a rich, but naïve old man, to fool him into believing he has been transported to the moon, where he has been duped into believing that women live according to the strict moral code he would impose on his daughters. Delighted with the lunar world, Buona Fede then has to watch the farrago that has been planned for him unfold, ultimately leaving him little option but to accede to the marriage of both girls and his shrewish maid, Lisetta, who he had hoped to marry himself.

Avondano’s music reveals him to be not only thoroughly conversant with buffa style, but melodically gifted and capable of orchestral writing that makes extensive use of the wind band. Arias are mostly brief and while few are memorable, there are several in the sentimental style that leave an impression, Clarice’s act 2 ‘Quanta gente che sospiri’ being perhaps the stand-out example, while his handling of the act finales is assured.

The present recording stems from performances given in the Teatro Thalia in Lisbon and omits some scenes and arias. It is curious, indeed unique in my experience, that while recitatives were recorded in live performance, the musical numbers were not, though there is little difference in acoustic. More fascinating is the experimental manner in which the recitatives were prepared, the cast learning the text but fitting it to music only after hearing the accompaniment in rehearsal. It certainly works in part, for the recits have an immediacy and lively point that is not always the case. Against that there are places where it feels over-played, in particular the silly voices adopted for what is presumably intended as ‘moon-speak’, which soon becomes irritating on record, particularly when no text or translation is available with the set.

The performance is dominated by the splendidly rounded bass of Luis Rodrigues’s Buona Fede, who also turns in a master class in vocal acting, relishing the foolish old man’s gullible antics. There is also some fine singing from the principal young couple, Ecclitico (Fernando Guimarães) and Clarice (Susana Gaspar) and another excellent bass, João Fernandes as the servant Cecco. The period-instrument orchestral playing is decent, if not of outstanding quality and the whole idiomatically directed with considerable verve by Marcos Magalhães. If a certain provincial air hangs over the project, that is more than outweighed by its infectious exuberance, a case of the heart being very much in the right place.

Brian Robins

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Royal Handel

Eva Zaïcik and Le Consort perform arias by Handel, Ariosti and Bononcini

Eva Zaïcik mezzo-soprano, Le Consort
64:59
Alpha Classics Alpha 662
+arias by Ariosti and Giovanni Bononcini

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Eva Zaïcik is a young French mezzo whose cv suggests she might have originally had ideas of becoming an early music specialist, but whose more recent work includes a debut as Carmen in Toulouse and appearances in Pique Dame and Eugene Onegin.  Having heard this CD my guess is that the latter type of repertoire is more likely to become mainstream for her. In full flow the voice is a richly opulent instrument, with a hint of edge to it in the middle register, which itself does not always sit in comfortable relationship with the soprano register. In Baroque repertoire Zaïcek’s voice is on this evidence at its most beguiling singing mezza voce, where the ear experiences a purity of tone and line not always apparent elsewhere. But in general terms neither her technique nor her approach to the mostly Handel arias on the present CD convince that she is truly at home with it. While there is an admirable flexibility and passaggi are in general well articulated, her approach to ornamentation is haphazard, cadences go unembellished and of course there is no hint of a trill. Not that Zaïcek is alone in that respect. As bad is her approach to text or more accurately non-approach. Contrary to the needs of these arias, the performances seem driven by the desire to make a beautiful, lustrous sound. Aria after aria passes with little attempt to explore its emotional core or meaningfully articulate its text.

In this respect, the singer is hardly aided by her choice of accompanists. Le Consort is one of those small French ensembles bearing no relationship to the size of an average 18th-century opera orchestra. It is also characteristic of so many ensembles today in that Le Concert appears to feel it necessary to play quick music very fast and slower numbers excessively slowly. Thus an aria such as ‘Rompo i lacci’ from Flavio is taken so fast as to render it virtually meaningless, despite some agile passagework from Zaïcek, while the funereal tempo and emasculated rhythm adopted for ‘Ombra cara’ (Radamisto) leaves the aria as little more than a glutinous, sentimental wallow.  There are two compensating factors. One is that mezza voce, where the lighter tonal palette can produce exquisite results, nowhere more so than the central section and da capo of ‘Deggio morire’ (Siroe), where criticism is silenced, the listener seduced into luxurious immersion in the sheer beauty of the moment. The other is the inclusion of first recordings of arias by two composers that along with Handel also contributed operas to the first Royal Academy in London (1719-28), the source of the CD’s title. Both Attilio Ariosti and Giovanni Bononcini scored significant successes in its early years and ‘Sagri numi’ from Ariosto’s Caio Marzio Coriolano (1723) is a ravishingly lovely discovery, though as with all the cantabile numbers it is sentimentalized and taken too deliberately.

If the response to this CD is perhaps a little harsh at times, it stems from the depressing regularity with which so many of today’s younger singers seemingly come to Baroque repertoire as a kind of warm-up for bigger, later parts. Such singers need to be taught to recognise that Baroque opera has its own demands that need to be met if they are going to do it more justice than simply winning cheap applause from mainstream critics and audiences.

Brian Robins

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Vivaldi: Argippo

CD cover Fabio Biondi directs Vivaldi's Argippo

Emőke Baráth Argippo, Marie Lys Osira, Delphine Galou Zanaida, Marianna Pizzolato Silvero, Luigi De Donato Tisifaro, Europa Galante, Fabio Biondi
123:00 (2 CDs in a jewel case with separate booklet, all in a card case)
naive OP 7079

Naïve’s attention to the operatic repertoire in its complete Vivaldi Edition is certainly not skimping. Here, following closely on the heels of an outstanding Tamerlano (Verona, 1735), a review of which appeared recently on EMR, is another pasticcio. Until recently, Argippo was considered to be lost, one of several operas from the early 1730s known only from a libretto housed in the University Library in Prague, where it was first given at the Teatro Sporck in 1730. A libretto for a slightly varied version of the opera given in Vienna, possibly earlier the same year, is also extant. Then, in 2011, an anonymous manuscript that can be linked to the opera was discovered in Darmstadt and it is this, alongside a collection of arias associated with the Vienna version, which formed the basis for the publication of the critical edition of the opera recorded here. Cast in the usual three acts, Argippo is a dramma per musica containing nine arias that can be attributed to Vivaldi. In addition, there are arias by his Venetian contemporaries G B Pescetti (4), A Galeazzi (a composer unknown to Grove Opera or any other authority I’ve consulted), the Milanese composer Andrea Fiorè, whose own setting of Argippo (Milan, 1722) is the source of Osira’s act 3 ‘Vado a morire’, one of the finest moments in the opera, and the better-known names of Hasse, Porpora and Vinci, each represented by a single aria.

The libretto was the work of Domenico Lalli, the poet who enjoyed the company of the composer D’Astorga during their adventurous travels through Europe during the second decade of the century (see the recent EMR review of D’Astorga sonatas and cantatas). It had first been set as Il gran mogol by Francesco Mancini for Naples in 1713, its exotic, colourful location in India conforming with the taste for opera seria to be given settings far removed from everyday life. The book is not exactly a masterpiece. It concerns Zanaida, the much-loved daughter of the Great Mogul, Tisifaro. She is convinced that she was seduced by Argippo, a tributary king, who married her, but then went off to commit bigamy with another princess, Osira. The opera revolves around a visit to Tisifaro by Argippo and Osira, during which it is revealed that Zanaida’s seducer was not Argippo but Tisifaro’s cousin and counsellor Silvero, this however not before poor Osira has been sentenced to death for her husband’s former ‘crime’. In a conclusion that defies all credibility, Zanaida agrees to marry Silvero, the man whose lust for her caused everyone else great distress.

It goes without saying there is no local colour and indeed for much of the first two acts there is little colour of any kind. An exception can be made for two arias for Zanaida, the first in act 1, ‘Se lento ancora in fulmine’ an aria di furia by Vivaldi, sung with glittering precision and fervent intensity by Delphine Galou, while ‘Che gran pena’ (act 2), a graciously melodic aria by Hasse, articulates the princess’s extreme conflicts of emotion. There is little doubt the impression made by these arias owes much to the dramatic commitment of the singer, whose work with her husband Ottavio Dantone has enabled Galou to attain new levels of excellence. Moreover, her delivery of plain recitative also stands out significantly from that of her colleagues. Among them, the Osira of soprano Marie Lys is a mixed success, infinitely touching and expressive in successive arias at the climax of the drama in act 3, but prone to brittle, razor-sharp brilliance in her upper range elsewhere. But she can be forgiven much for the lovely trill at the final cadence of ‘Vado a morir’. In any event, the sometimes wildly extravagant da capo excursions into the stratosphere are not unique to her. I wonder when singers will learn that such lapses of taste invariably end in tears, for the listener at least. Notwithstanding most of the singing is well above average, with some expectedly lovely cantabile from Emőke Baráth’s wronged Argippo and noble bass tone from Luigi De Donato’s suitably regal Tisifaro.

Fabio Biondi’s direction is efficient, but to my ears not particularly inspiring. As so often with him, mannerisms can be irritating, particularly his encouragement of a continuo lutenist whose hyperactivity consistently distracts attention from the voice. The sound also lacks the immediacy of other recent issues in this series. Those collecting the series can be assured of another set well worthy of investigating, but the uncommitted may find it a less appealing proposition

Brian Robins

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Vivaldi: Tamerlano

Dantone conducts Vivaldi's opera Tamerlano for the naïve complete series

Bruno Taddia Bajazet, Filippo Mineccia Tamerlano, Delphine Galou Asteria, Sophie Ennert Irene, Marina De Liso Andronico, Arianna Vendittelli Idaspe, Accademia Bizantina, Ottavio Dantone
Vivaldi Edition vol. 65
155:00 (3 CDs in a box)
OP 7080

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Volume 65 of naïve’s remarkable Vivaldi integrale brings us one of the last of the complete opera’s still to be recorded. Il Tamerlano is one of Vivaldi’s later operas composed not for Venice but the historic Accademia Filharmonica of Verona, whose appointment of Vivaldi as impresario for the 1735 Carnival season resulted in two operas, Adelaide and Il Tamerlano, both probably premiered in January.

Of the now lost Adelaide, we know nothing beyond the fact its libretto is most likely by Antonio Salvi (a text set by Handel as Lotario in 1729), while Il Tamerlano is a pasticcio assembled by Vivaldi from previously composed operas of his own and those of Giacomelli (3 arias), Hasse (3) and Riccardo Broschi, Farinelli’s brother, two of whose arias were incorporated. They are all identified in the booklet, though it’s quite fun to listen first and see how many one can identify as not being by Vivaldi. One of the most remarkable to my mind is ‘Sposa son disprezzata’ (As a bride I am despised), taken from Giacomelli’s Merope (Venice, 1734). It is an aria for Irene, the woman abandoned by her fiancée Tamerlano for Asteria, the daughter of the imprisoned Bajazet, who he has conquered in battle. Full of stabbing pain and dissonance, it serves as a reminder that Giacomelli still remains undeservedly neglected. Vivaldi was thus left with just the recitatives, including several accompagnati, to compose from the libretto by Agostino Piovene, a book first set by Gasparini as Il Bajazet in 1711 and subsequently by several others composers including Handel in 1724. The piecemeal nature of Il Tamerlano thus serves to remind present-day opera lovers that far from being a despised form it is often characterised as today, the 18th-century pasticcio was a valid form in itself, utilised by just about every major opera composer of the day, including of course Handel.

The reason it was possible to swap arias from one opera to another is because arias fall almost exclusively into one of two forms: generic expressions of human emotions such as love, hate, jealousy and so on, emotional expressions obviously as valid today as they were in the 18th century; or more impersonal so-called ‘simile’ arias that compared feelings or impressions with something in nature, like a storm at sea. Plot came a long way behind poetic expression and Il Bajazet is unusual in this period in having a strong, direct storyline that concerns the all-conquering Tamerlano’s relationships with the defeated, yet still proud and stubborn Sultan Bajazet and his daughter Asteria, the true heroes of the story (the original libretto was called Il Bajazet). Only with the death of Bajazet does Tamerlano renounce his philandering and turn to being the nobly forgiving and repentant ruler the sentiment of opera per dramma dictates he must finally be.

Ottavio Dantone and his Accademia Bizantina have for a while now been the performers of choice for the operas in the Vivaldi Edition (along with a number of orchestral issues). It is not difficult to see why. In 2019 they produced a superlative account of Il Giustino (1724), an issue matched by this Il Tamerlano, which might be described in a single word: electrifying. Rarely does a studio recording have the febrile excitement we encounter here, a performance in which Dantone has galvanized every one of his performers into singing or playing with an intensity that ranges from anger to distress, from tenderness to evocation of the gentleness of the turtledove. It is founded on Dantone’s belief in the sanctity of text, a belief that provides a foundation for all his opera performances and which involves extensive work on recitative. Virtually every word is invested with meaning and expressed by an outstanding cast that has bought totally into the approach. It would be difficult to envisage more convincing performances of Bajazet, originally a role for tenor, but here commandingly sung by the light baritone Bruno Taddia, of Asteria, a glowing, finely-nuanced assumption by Delphine Galou or the supremely accomplished Tamerlano of Filippo Mineccia, now surely well up near the top of the countertenor league in a crowded field. Of the remaining roles soprano Marina De Liso is a near-flawless Andronico, the Greek Prince who would save Bajazet and loves and is loved by Asteria. Arianna Vendittelli (Idaspe) and Sophie Rennert (Irene) complete a cast that matches Dantone’s fervent advocacy, though neither is free from the common failure of lack of vocal control above the stave. It remains only to note that ornaments are mostly fluently and stylishly added, though as usual cadential (and other) trills are largely noticeable by their absence. But we do get an even more rarely heard ornament from Vendittelli in the shape of a perfectly executed messa di voce in Idaspe’s opening aria.

It hardly needs saying in conclusion that Dantone’s Il Tamerlano is a magnificent achievement, unquestionably one of the most important issues of a wretched 2020 redeemed in part by some truly remarkable recordings.

Brian Robins

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Music is the Cure

La Ninfea's Musical Medicine Chest

Or La Ninfea’s Musical Medicine Chest
Minko Ludwig tenor, La Ninfea
67:10
Perfect Noise PN1904

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Music by Henry Purcell, Anthony Holborne, Giles Farnaby, Lully, Marais, Charpentier and Tobias Hume is linked here by traditional tunes and improvised divisions in a regular chemist’s shop of sickness and cures. La Ninfea have trawled far and wide through the music of the Renaissance and the early Baroque to find pieces with medical resonances and have come up with a pleasing programme on their theme, which includes some familiar and unfamiliar songs and instrumental music, ranging from the predictable Purcell glees to unanticipated dips into French Baroque opera. There is an engaging contemplative quality about their accounts here, particularly in the very free divisions, which almost take on the ambience of improvisatory jazz. The playing is generally very convincing, and the blend between the instruments and with the voice pleasant and persuasive. I like the way the improvisatory quality of the divisions seems to spill over and pervade all of the tracks. The dance movements have an involving swing to them, while the performers seem to enjoy exploring the textural potential of their instruments.

D. James Ross

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Draghi: El Prometeo

CD cover of Draghi El prometeo

Fabio Trümpy, Scott Conner, Mariana Flores, Giussepina Bridelli, Borja Quiza, Zachary Wilder, Ana Quintans, Kamil Ben Hsaïn Lachiri, Victor Torrès, Anna Reinhold, Alejandro Meerapfel, Lucía Martín-Cartón, Chœur de Chambre de Namur, Cappella Mediterranea, Leonardo Gracía Alarcón
128:34 (2 CDs in a card tryptych)
Alpha Classics Alpha 582

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Antonio Draghi’s opera on the Prometheus legend sets his own libretto and was first performed in Vienna in 1669 in honour of the birthday of the Queen of Spain, a member of the House of Habsburg. In addition to translating his libretto from Italian into Spanish for the occasion, Draghi introduces several Spanish features into his setting, but essentially he is transplanting the Venetian operatic tradition to Vienna, where it will flourish and flow so successfully into the classical operatic masterpieces of the late 18th century. This important opera has been prevented from taking its proper place in the operatic canon by dint of the shocking fact that Draghi’s music for Act 3 has disappeared without trace! The present ‘complete’ recording has been possible only after the intervention of the director Leonardo García Alarcón, whose Promethean ‘recomposition’ of the missing music has brought the opera back to life. Recorded in the Dijon Opera house as part of an extended tour, the CDs manage to capture an authentic ambience without any extraneous noises. As is so often the case when works are reconstructed, the most remarkable passages turn out to be in the original score, and this is definitely true here as in the remarkably adventurous chorus which concludes Act II. Here and elsewhere, Draghi shows himself to be a harmonically daring composer, as well as a considerable master of the lyrical melody and the dramatically charged ensemble. Alarcón has assembled an excellent line-up of soloists and a splendid chorus for this recording, and you can tell that this recording has matured as a staged production. They are ably accompanied by the instrumental Cappella Mediterranea in a recording which should do much to restore this overlooked opera and its remarkable composer to their rightful place in the operatic pantheon.

D. James Ross

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Monteverdi: Orfeo

Monteverdi Orfeo I gemelli Gonzalez Toro

Emiliano Gonzalez Toro Orfeo, Emőke Baráth Euridice/Musica, Natalie Pérez Messaggiera, Alix Le Saux Speranza/Pastore iii, Jérôme Varnier Caronte/Spirito, Mathilde Etienne Proserpina, Nicolas Brooymans Plutone/Pastore iv, Fulvio Bettini Apollo/Spirito/Eco, Zachary Wilder Pastore i/Spirito, Juan Sancho Pastore ii/Spirito, Alicia Amo Ninfa, Ensemble Vocal de Poche, I Gemelli
97:00 (2 CDs in a single case within a card folder with booklet)
naïve V 7176

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From the opening triple statement of the Toccata, crisply articulated and introducing variants of instrumentation for each stanza, it seems likely that this will be an imaginative version of Monteverdi’s first opera. And so it proves. It is the brain child of tenor Emiliano Gonzalez Toro, who not only sings the title role but directs his recently formed (2018) and excellent early music ensemble I Gemelli. In a note in the booklet Toro explains that it has been a career-long ambition to stage Orfeo, an ambition fulfilled in 2019 when it was given in Paris and Toulouse in a production by Mathilde Etienne, who not also sings a gently persuasive and touching Proserpine but is also responsible for an exceptionally scholarly booklet note. The present studio recording is based on those performances. 

The promise of the Toccata is maintained in a Prologue that is beautifully delivered by Emőke Baráth’s La Musica, each stanza of her varied verses in the recently-arrived stile recitativo inflected with real understanding of the text and incorporating little touches of ornamentation. With the arrival of the chorus that will play a major role in the wedding celebrations of Orfeo and Euridice, the opera moves to its Janus-like stance of looking both forward and backward. While the big opening chorus, ‘Vieni Imeneo’ is homophonic, many of the choruses are madrigalian and here Toro has clearly differentiated them by employing an outstanding one-per-part ensemble drawn from his soloists. It is a measure of how Toro has obviously thought deeply about the opera when he drops the continuo accompaniment entirely for the final lines of the tragic conclusion of act 2 – ‘Ahi caso acerbo …’ (Ah, bitter blow…), thus providing a stunning peroration and compounding further the profound emotional impact of all that has happened since the arrival of Messaggiera (the excellent Natalie Pérez) with news of the death of Euridice. Momentarily looking back to the wedding festivities, I do feel Toro takes some of the madrigalian choruses too swiftly, ‘Lasciate i monti’, being a particular example.

Emiliano Gonzalez Toro is a rare example of a singer seemingly equally at home in French and Italian Baroque opera. In some ways Orfeo, with its continuous stream of recitative, arioso and choruses is closer in outline to the French style, doubtless one reason Toro is so fond of it. He brings to the role only not a an exceptionally well-produced voice of great beauty, but a temperament well equipped to intensify (and release) emotion when called upon to do so. This feature is at its peak in act 3, of which of course the great florid outpouring of ‘Possente spirto’ forms the axis of the opera, not for nothing placed at its exact central point. Like all self-respecting Orfeo’s Toro of course sings Monteverdi’s heavily ornamented version and needless to say sings it well, though he does tend to skate over some of the very dense, fast moving passaggi. It is in fact perhaps the major weakness of the set that none of the singers is totally satisfying in respect of ornamentation. This defect is particularly acute at cadences, invariably left unadorned and thus leaving endings pallid and uninteresting. Returning to Toro’s Orfeo in that critical third act, it is at moments of heightened emotion that it is at its most truly compelling. Listen for example to the hopeless desperation in the voice at the end of Speranza’s aria; ‘Dove, ah, dove t’en vai’ … (Where, o where are you going …). At the end of ‘Possente spirto’ Monteverdi’s ornamented version finishes on the words ‘O de lei mei luci sereni’… (O clear light of my eyes…). At this point Orfeo’s use of his musical prowess to seduce Charon (Jérôme Varnier) ends and the poignant, bitter truth takes over; it’s a moment Toro takes full advantage of, as he does the great outburst of passion after Charon’s response, ‘Ahi, sveturato amante…’ (Alas, unhappy lover that I am …

There are many other moments in Toro’s performance that might be highlighted, and I’m sure it will repay further study. Equally impressive is the care with which he has ensured that all his excellent cast has been carefully coached to remember the critical maxim in this music – prima le parole, poi la musica. Were it not for the lack of ornamentation this might have become my favourite version, but it is an important flaw. It is salutary that for a more stylish approach to embellishment it is necessary to go back to Nigel Rogers’ 1984 outstanding recording on EMI, interestingly another version where the Orfeo also undertook the musical direction (with Charles Medlam).

Brian Robins

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Cesti: La Dori

Cesti's Dori performed at the Innsbruck Festival

Ascioti, Baráth, Lombardi Mazzulli, Enticknap, Sacchi, Accademia Bizantina, Ottavio Dantone
160:46 (2 CDs in a single jewel case with booklet in a cardboard sleeve)
cpo 555 309-2

(Innsbruck Festival 2019)

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Venetian opera of the second half of the 17th century was marked by a remarkable flexibility of form involving recitativo cantando (sung recitative of the type familiar from the operas of Monteverdi) arioso and aria, the last often in strophic form. Frequently all three were seamlessly integrated and alternated to create fast-moving action involving both serious and comic episodes in which text was rarely subject to all but a minimal amount of repetition. Even more than Gluck’s so-called ‘reform’ operas, Venetian opera came close to realising a prototype of Wagner’s ideal of the Gesamtkunstwerk over 200 years before he formulated it.

Although many composers were active in Venice and beyond during the period, two names in particular stand out: those of Cavalli and Cesti. Of the two Cavalli is today by far the better known, a number of his operas have been revived in more recent times. Pietro Antonio Cesti remains a more shadowy figure, this despite having composed two of the most successful operas of the entire century, Orontea and La Dori. His relative obscurity may at least in part be accounted for because his greatest successes were composed not for Venice – thereby leaving him less explored by writers on Venetian opera – but Innsbruck, where he served the Archduke Ferdinand Karl from 1652 until 1657, and Vienna, where he was put in charge of theatre music in 1666. Both Orontea and La Dori date from the Innsbruck period, premiered in 1656 and 1657 respectively, but both became widely performed throughout Italy, La Dori achieving at least 30 productions by the 1680s.

2019 marked the 350th anniversary of the death of Cesti, so for the Innsbruck Early Music Festival to, as it were, bring La Dori home for that year’s edition was a particularly felicitous idea, the results of which are now available on this set. I was fortunate enough to be there, happily one of the most exhilarating productions of a 17th opera I’ve yet to see, sympathetically staged, with outstanding lighting, and sumptuously and colourfully costumed, in keeping with its being set in Babylon. Quite apart from much outstanding music, La Dori has the advantage of a splendidly varied libretto of high literary standard by Giovanni Filippo Apolloni. The story is highly complex, involving an arranged dynastic marriage that is very nearly foiled multiple times both in the prehistory of the plot and during the course of the opera itself. At breath-taking pace we are taken through a series of events involving mistaken identity, disguise, love intrigues and comic interludes, the latter mostly involving that stock character of Venetian opera, the old nurse Dirce, a role sung here with comic relish by tenor Alberto Allegrezza. Cesti’s music runs a wide gamut between tuneful dance-like arias in triple time to ravishingly sensual love music and near-tragic solo scenas, sometimes in close juxtaposition. At the pivotal point in act 2 Prince Oronte, still seeking his Dori, but having been convinced she is dead, dictates to the slave Ali (Dori in disguise) a letter to Arsinoe, the woman it has been arranged he will marry in the stead of Dori. It is a poignant scene, handled by Cesti with sensitivity and consummate dramatic skill and beautifully sung and vocally acted by Rupert Enticknap (Oronte) and Francesca Ascioti (Dori/Ali).

In keeping with the minimal instrumental forces customarily required for Venetian opera, La Dori is scored for continuo with two violins, whose role is near-exclusively confined to ritornellos. Ottavio Dantone has opted for a rather more generous orchestration, with three first and three second violins at times joined by recorders and a rich continuo group that includes the anachronistic addition of harp and chamber organ in addition to the expected bass strings, theorbos and harpsichords. Notwithstanding the continuo is deployed with such sensitivity and musicality that anything but the mildest censure is stilled, particularly in the face of direction that captures the essence of the work with unerring empathy and a thrilling sense of theatre. Dantone’s insistence on his singers devoting unusual attention to words is especially apposite in text-driven operas like La Dori and bears fruit in the vivid declamation in recitative and beautiful expressed Italian in cantabile music. His entire cast in fact does him credit. Emőke Baráth’s Tolomeo/Celinda (a woman playing a man disguised as a woman – I did warn you!) is sung with complete tonal security, while soprano Francesca Lombardi Mazzulli is a touching and impressive Arsinoe. The smaller roles are all exceptionally well taken. My only caveat is that I would have liked to have heard more ornamentation and for what is heard to have been more stylish and clearly articulated. That said this is one of the most musically and dramatically satisfying recordings of a Venetian opera available. La Dori deserves to be far more widely known; its pace, colour and variety would make it an ideal opera for Glyndebourne.

Brian Robins