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Director, set & costume designer: John Pascoe Recorded at Teatro Caio Melisso, Spoleto, Italy, July 2007 “This is a very impressively sung DVD set of Ariodante, led by Ann Hallenberg in the castrato title-role, who manages her complex divisions with aplomb. Laura Cherici, Ariodante's beloved Ginevra, also has a lovely voice when singing expressively” Penguin Guide “Ann Hallenberg is one of the glories of the Baroque scene. She sang the greatest of this oratorio´s extravagant string of hit-tunes with melting tenderness.” The Times | | | Usually despatched in 2 - 3 working days. |
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Recording Date: 1996
Place of recording: From the English National Opera
Running Time: 178 min
Picture Format: 16:9
Sound Format: PCM Stereo
Menu Languages PAL: D, F, GB, SP
Subtitle Languages PAL: D, F
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In this complete recording of Ariodante, Alan Curtis, a supreme Handelian conductor and scholar, joins forces with glorious mezzo soprano Joyce DiDonato, who, with her Virgin Classics album of Handel arias, ‘Furore’, “scored a triumph … which not only shows her phenomenal technical talent, but verily crackles with dramatic fire” (BBC). In 2010, Virgin Classics released Curtis’ recording of Handel’s opera Berenice. The US magazine Opera News welcomed it, saying: “At the helm of the superb period-instrument ensemble Il Complesso Barocco, with its smooth violin section and supple, energetic continuo, Alan Curtis paces a well-chosen cast with his customary precision and command ... Singers never seem musically constrained or theatrically hampered, and … the cast exhibits a welcome sureness with Handel's style and rhetorical presentation, both individually and as an ensemble.” In Ariodante, DiDonato takes the title role of a young prince -- remaining in male mode throughout after her recent gender-swapping antics on the operatic recital CD ‘Diva, Divo’, The role was written for the star castrato Carestini and includes two contrasting showpieces -- ‘Dopo notte’ and ‘Scherza, infida’ – both among the most famous of all Handel’s opera arias. When DiDonato sang Ariodante in Geneva in 2007, the Financial Times wrote: “How confidently she brings off trouser roles and what spine-tingling effect she puts into a bravura piece such as ‘Dopo notte’”, while the Neue Zürcher Zeitung felt that: “her bright, homogeneous mezzo soprano is wonderfully suited to the passionate lover who, just before his wedding, believes he has been deceived by his betrothed.” The supposedly unfaithful Princess Ginevra is sung here by the sensuous-toned Canadian soprano Karina Gauvin, praised in Handel by Opera News for her “tonal substance, even at pianissimo,” and her “real bel canto technique, all in one voice from top to bottom; the whole aria is carefully shaped without breaking the Baroque boundaries”. Joining DiDonato and Gauvin in the cast are another fine Canadian singer, contralto Marie-Nicole Lemieux, the charming Spanish soprano Sabina Puertolas and the elegant Finnish tenor Topi Lehtipuu. Gramophone has said that “Alan Curtis has done more than most to prove that many of Handel's 42 operas are first-rate music dramas”, while the BBC Music Magazine has praised him as “a seasoned Handelian who has contributed, perhaps more than anyone now, to the composer’s operas on disc.” This new recording will further support both those claims and the New York Times’ judgement that he is “one of the great scholar-musicians of recent times”. “in Alan Curtis's scrupulously detailed performance, Joyce diDonato's gleaming legato and coloratura are upstaged by the elegance of Karina Gauvin's Ginevra. While diDonato offers recklessly inventive da capo decorations, Gauvin favours measured pathos...for a complex and moving Ginevra, this is the Ariodante to have” BBC Music Magazine, July 2011 **** “[DiDonato] matches thrilling technical despatch to personable characterisation...She is surrounded by a cast of equally accomplished Handelians...But the key lies in the inspiring musical direction of Curtis...From Il Complesso Barocco, his hand-picked band, he draws playing of infinite flexibility and unforced style.” Financial Times, 14th May 2011 **** “Ariodante is sung by the wonderful Joyce DiDonato. "Con l'ali di constanza" is taken at quite a lick: fair enough, as the reference is to Cupid's wings. In "Scherz, infida", with its mournful bassoon, DiDonato has the full measure of Ariodante's despair...There are no weaknesses in the rest of the cast. Alan Curtis directs with his customary stylishness and, in the "Ballo di ninfe...", a nice touch of rustic phrasing.” Gramophone Magazine, August 2011 “[diDonato's] bravura technique - great Rossini singer that she is - is second to none in 'Dopo notte'. She also brings a rich palette of vocal colour and emotional nuance to Ariodante's other sublime arias...[This is] perhaps the most consistently well-cast Ariodante on record...Curtis's cast, his always sensible approach to tempo...and the superb playing of his Complesso Barocco put this set close to the top of the Ariodante pile.” International Record Review, July 2011 “[DiDonato] is almost as compelling a Handelian as she is a Rossinian. She brings rapt expression to Ariodante’s outburst of rage and despair, Scherza infida, with its doleful bassoon solo, and almost jazzily syncopated bravura to his final show stopper, Dopo notte. These are among the American singer’s finest achievements on disc...She is surrounded by a cast without a weak link: as the wrongly accused Ginevra, Karina Gauvin phrases with sculptural beauty” Sunday Times, 12th June 2011 **** “Tempos are wonderfully fresh and vigorous, the phrasing crisp without being clipped...But the singing is the glory of the set: Joyce DiDonato confirms her reputation as the finest Handelian mezzo-soprano of the day...she is so clean of tone, so true of pitch and engaged by the drama that it is impossible to carp. Marie-Nicole Lemieux is thrillingly incisive as the dashingly villainous Polinesso.” The Telegraph, 12th May 2011 ***** | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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Guardian Top 50 albums of all time Oct 1997 “Handel's Ariodante contains some achingly beautiful music. Here it is given the finest of performances. Lorraine Hunt as Ariodante is a compelling hero, tender in love and bitter in suspicion…. Her singing is both engaged and engaging, her voice sure and even from top to bottom. McGegan encourages an energy and verve that never slips from the highest standard of style and refinement.” Classic CD, April 1997 | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| | | This item is currently out of stock at the UK distributor. You may order it now but please be aware that it may be six weeks or more before it can be despatched. |
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Prizes: 1999 Cannes Classical Awards, Classic CD Award “Lynne Dawson is the star of this show. In Act 2, where Ginevra finds herself inexplicably rejected and condemned by everyone, Dawson brings real depth of tone and feeling to her E minor lament, 'Il mio crudel martoro'; in the final act she shines in the desolate miniature 'Io ti bacio' and brings much fire to the outburst 'Sì, morro'.
But she never transgresses the canons of Baroque style. Von Otter, too, has much marvellous music – the aria 'Scherza infida' is one of Handel's greatest expressions of grief – and she sings it beautifully, but she isn't really at one with his idiom and seems to lack a natural feeling for the amplitude of Handel's lines.
Yet there's much to enjoy here too, the beauty of the actual sound, the immaculate control, the many telling and musicianly touches of phrasing.
But the noble, climactic triumphant aria, 'Dopo notte' doesn't have quite the effect it should. For that, however, Minkowski is partly to blame. Carried away, it almost seems, by the passion of the music, he's often inclined to go at it baldheaded, too fast and with a ferocity of accent that seems foreign to the style and dangerously close to ugly.
Veronica Cangemi makes a charming Dalinda, light, spirited and duly agile, with some gently pathetic expression in the delightful siciliana song early in Act 2. Ewa Podles brings her large, resonant voice to Polinesso's music; and the King of Scotland's fatherly music is done with due fullness and warmth by Denis Sedov, who covers the two-octave range with comfort and resonance.
Despite the driven quality of Minkowski's performance, especially in the high dramatic music of the latter part of the opera, the sheer passion of this set does give it claims to be considered first choice. The admirable McGegan performance is possibly a safer buy, and in some respects it's a more stylish performance, but the singing here, Lynne Dawson's above all, is on balance superior.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010 “with an outstanding, starry team of soloists, Marc Minkowski conducts a high-powered reading, urgently dramatic and a compelling set in every way.” Penguin Guide, 2010 *** | | | Usually despatched in 2 - 3 working days. |
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