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.
Conceived by Marc-Antoine Charpentier (1643-1704) to serve as musical interludes for a revival at the Jesuit college of Harcourt in 1680 of Pierre Corneille’s play, Polyeucte Martyr (originally written in 1642), the ballet Le combat de l'amour divin was composed for string orchestra with trumpets, kettledrums and continuo.
It presents several dance entries with varied titles that suggest the martyr’s internal conflict («Sentiments genereux et lasches» («Generous and cowardly feelings»).
Charpentier’s Andromède was also a revival; written by Corneille in 1650, this tragedy was performed again in April 1682, with new music composed by Charpentier to replace the original score of Charles Dassoucy. This revival, which was enormously expensive (above all for the costume and scenery ), doubtless aimed at restoring the glory of the Comédie Française, whose productions had been eclipsed by the new operas (tragédies lyriques) of Lully. In fact at the same time, Lully gave the first performances of his Persée — an opera composed on a libretto by Quinault which deals with the same myth. As Catherine Cessac explains in her book (Marc-Antoine Charpentier, Paris, 1988; rev. 2004; Engl. Translation 1995), Charpentier’s music was conceived in the same spirit as the decor and stage machines, which were the main attraction of the spectacle.
The recording by the New Chamber Opera and the Band of Instrument, directed by Gary Cooper, is uneven. In Andromède’s overture the musicians seem sometimes hesitant, which provokes a certain instability in rhythm as well as in dynamics; but the performance quickly picks up and gains in homogeneity when we hear the four singers (Rachel Elliott, soprano; James Gilchrist, tenor; Thomas Guthrie, baritone; Giles Underwood, bass) who are always very expressive. In this respect, the last two choruses of Andromède are quite successful.
The Ballet de Polieucte, opens with an overture originally composed by Charpentier for the revival, in July 1679, of Le Dépit amoureux, a play written by Molière in 1656. Here the instrumentalists exhibit a certain mastery of the style of the work, and manage to underline the contrasts between the dance entries (particularly in the striking «Marche de Triomphe», or gay «La joye seulle»).
Despite a few imperfections, we should be grateful that this recording presents us with two unknown works by Charpentier. But a recording cannot in any sense replace a stage representation and we hope that it may open the way for new performances (on stage). It is a pity that that these two musical plays have not yet aroused the interest and curiosity of stage directors, actors and musicians, particularly in this fourth centenary of the birth of Pierre Corneille (1606-1684). While in the Comédie Française in Paris Moliere’s Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, L’Amour médecin and the Sicilien, with music by Lully, have enjoyed considerable, well merited, success for many years now, Corneille remains very neglected. But John Powell, Professor at the University of Tulsa (USA), eminent specialist of the music and theater in 17th century, invites us to appreciate his reconstruction of Andromède on the following web site: http://www.personal.utulsa.edu/~john-powell/Andromede/index.htm
Marie-Alexis Colin
Université de Montréal