The Sixteen continues its exploration of Henry Purcell’s Welcome Songs for Charles II. As with Robert King’s pioneering Purcell series begun over thirty years ago for Hyperion, Harry Christophers is recording two Welcome Songs per disc.
In February this year, Albanian soprano Ermonela Jaho made a highly lauded debut recital at Wigmore Hall - a concert which both celebrated Opera Rara’s 50th anniversary and honoured the career of the Italian soprano Rosina Storchio (1872-1945), the star of verismo who created the title roles in Leoncavallo’s La bohème and Zazà, Mascagni’s Lodoletta and Puccini’s Madama Butterfly.
Collapsology. Or, perhaps we should use the French word ‘Collapsologie’ because this is a transdisciplinary idea pretty much advocated by a series of French theorists - and apparently, mostly French theorists. It in essence focuses on the imminent collapse of modern society and all its layers - a series of escalating crises on a global scale: environmental, economic, geopolitical, governmental; the list is extensive.
Amongst an avalanche of new Mahler recordings appearing at the moment (Das Lied von der Erde seems to be the most favoured, with three) this 1991 Mahler Second from the 2nd Kassel MahlerFest is one of the more interesting releases.
If there is one myth, it seems believed by some people today, that probably needs shattering it is that post-war recordings or performances of Wagner operas were always of exceptional quality. This 1949 Hamburg Tristan und Isolde is one of those recordings - though quite who is to blame for its many problems takes quite some unearthing.
The voices of six women composers are celebrated by baritone Jeremy Huw Williams and soprano Yunah Lee on this characteristically ambitious and valuable release by Lontano Records Ltd (Lorelt).
As Paul Spicer, conductor of the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire Chamber Choir, observes, the worship of the Blessed Virgin Mary is as ‘old as Christianity itself’, and programmes devoted to settings of texts which venerate the Virgin Mary are commonplace.
Ethel Smyth’s last large-scale work, written in 1930 by the then 72-year-old composer who was increasingly afflicted and depressed by her worsening deafness, was The Prison – a ‘symphony’ for soprano and bass-baritone soloists, chorus and orchestra.
‘Hamilton Harty is Irish to the core, but he is not a musical nationalist.’
‘After silence, that which comes closest to expressing the inexpressible is music.’ Aldous Huxley’s words have inspired VOCES8’s new disc, After Silence, a ‘double album in four chapters’ which marks the ensemble’s 15th anniversary.
A song-cycle is a narrative, a journey, not necessarily literal or linear, but one which carries performer and listener through time and across an emotional terrain. Through complement and contrast, poetry and music crystallise diverse sentiments and somehow cohere variability into an aesthetic unity.
One of the nicest things about being lucky enough to enjoy opera, music and theatre, week in week out, in London’s fringe theatres, music conservatoires, and international concert halls and opera houses, is the opportunity to encounter striking performances by young talented musicians and then watch with pleasure as they fulfil those sparks of promise.
“It’s forbidden, and where’s the art in that?”
Dublin-born John F. Larchet (1884-1967) might well be described as the father of post-Independence Irish music, given the immense influenced that he had upon Irish musical life during the first half of the 20th century - as a composer, musician, administrator and teacher.
The English Civil War is raging. The daughter of a Puritan aristocrat has fallen in love with the son of a Royalist supporter of the House of Stuart. Will love triumph over political expediency and religious dogma?
Beethoven Symphony no 9 (the Choral Symphony) in D minor, Op. 125, and the Choral Fantasy in C minor, Op. 80 with soloist Kristian Bezuidenhout, Pablo Heras-Casado conducting the Freiburger Barockorchester, new from Harmonia Mundi.
A Louise Brooks look-a-like, in bobbed black wig and floor-sweeping leather trench-coat, cheeks purple-rouged and eyes shadowed in black, Barbara Hannigan issues taut gestures which elicit fire-cracker punch from the Mahler Chamber Orchestra.
‘Signor Piatti in a fantasia on themes from Beatrice di Tenda had also his triumph. Difficulties, declared to be insuperable, were vanquished by him with consummate skill and precision. He certainly is amazing, his tone magnificent, and his style excellent. His resources appear to be inexhaustible; and altogether for variety, it is the greatest specimen of violoncello playing that has been heard in this country.’
Baritone Roderick Williams seems to have been a pretty constant ‘companion’, on my laptop screen and through my stereo speakers, during the past few ‘lock-down’ months.
Melodramas can be a difficult genre for composers. Before Richard Strauss’s Enoch Arden the concept of the melodrama was its compact size – Weber’s Wolf’s Glen scene in Der Freischütz, Georg Benda’s Ariadne auf Naxos and Medea or even Leonore’s grave scene in Beethoven’s Fidelio.
![Mariinsky MAR0512 [2CDs]](http://www.operatoday.com/MAR0512.gif)
Flute players in opera orchestra around the world must look forward to the frequent appearances of Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor, knowing that while the stage spotlight in the mad scene will be on the soprano, the orchestral spotlight will be on their instrument.
Unless…the conductor follows the fashion of adhering to the composer’s original thought and employing a glass harmonica in place of the flute. And that occurs more and more often. Two pieces of evidence here: a 2006 Bergamo Musica Festival production, and perhaps more surprisingly, the 2010 Mariinksy Theater recording. In both cases, the glass harmonica definitely adds to the creepy atmosphere of the scene. The Mariinsky recording offers a sharper aural picture, and the glass harmonicist etches a very clean line of echoing response to soprano Natalie Dessay. The glass harmonica counterpart in the Bergamo recording seems to be caught further from the microphones, slightly dulling the intended effect.
However, in most other respects the Bergamo version scores points over the Mariinsky. Some might have wondered if the starry names associated with the Mariinksy would mean a rival to the opera’s best recorded versions might be appearing. Such is not the case. Conductor Valery Gergiev has a broad symphonic repertoire, but his leadership of Italian opera has received mixed notices. Here, he sustains a poised reading, with no errant tempos or capricious highlighting of stray orchestral detail. Ultimately, however, the reading is a bit dull. More of that Gergiev idiosyncrasy might have helped. The supporting cast is mostly Russian (or at least house singers of the Mariinsky). The heavy tones of Vladislav Sulimsky’s Enrico and Ilya Bannik’s Raimondo blur the characters and veer toward cartoonish villainy.
Gergiev has two superstars as his leads. Lucia is a Natalie Dessay specialty, but this recording almost clinically details the wear and stresses on her instrument from her most recent vocal crisis. The voice is intact, but the suppleness is gone, and high notes fly uncomfortably close to screech territory. Surprisingly, Piotr Bezcala also seems to be in less than ideal voice, with his long final scene occasionally rushed and forced. Both have behind them many finer performances in these roles.
The recordings coming from the Mariinksy label benefit from handsome art design and traditionally generous booklets.
The Naxos, on the other hand, has a thin booklet and nothing else (this is the audio version of a performance also available from Naxos on DVD). The live production was nothing special to look at, and the audio version allows listeners to focus on what an idiomatic conductor and orchestra can provide, as well as the less starry but very capable cast.
Luca Grassi as Enrico and Enrico Giuseppe Iori as Raimondo both possess the right sound for their roles. As Edgardo, the Naxos offers Roberto De Blasio, a rising tenor who has started to pick up a few Metropolitan Opera assignments in the last season. He has just the right weight for the role - masculine, yet limber. In the years since this 2006 recording, he has hopefully brought some more distinctive coloring to his singing. In the title role, Désirée Rancatore puts on a high note display, with crisp coloratura. The middle voice, however, sags under a loose vibrato. Dessay may sound exhausted in her mad scene (not inappropriate), but Rancatore exhausts her listeners in hers, with more of an assault on the scene than an interpretation.
If neither of these versions comes anywhere close the best of the many available recordings of Lucia, the Naxos still deserves the edge for its fluency and old-fashioned commitment.
Chris Mullins