An old-fashioned girl
Perhaps it was the heatwave or the contentment of just having been able to hear her live again, but I went a bit overboard for this week’s Chris’s Cache in assembling an extravagant bouquet of Emőke Baráth, a favorite baroque diva.

Kathy Wittman
Included are live performances of scads of Handel, along with music by JS Bach, Mozart, Vivaldi, and Terradellas.
John Yohalem recently wrote about this soprano’s Boston Early Music Festival return in the title role of Reinhard Keiser’s Die römische Unruhe, od Hader Die edelmütige Octavia. I heard a later performance as well as her contribution to a wonderful 17th century Italian “greatest hits” late-night concert there. In 2019 she participated in BEMF’s production of Steffani’s Orlando Generoso.
The same year—2011—that Baráth won the International Singing Competition for Baroque Opera “Pietro Antonio Cesti” at the Innsbruck Festival, I heard her subsequent first major international appearance as Sesto in Giulio Cesare conducted by Alan Curtis who became her early champion. The Sesto was then recorded and became the first of a sizable number of excellent CDs that Baráth has released.
Since then, her U.S. appearances have been few, but I’ve collected along the way many broadcasts, mostly of 18th century music, some (!) of which I’m including today.
I’m very fond of her pair of solo CDs on Erato: Voglio Cantar, her Barbara Strozzi collection, and Dualità which pairs Handel arias written for male characters with those for female ones.
She also appears in several BEMF CD releases including Steffani’s Duets of Love and Passion (are there any other kind?) and in the title role of Handel’s Almira, the composer’s only surviving German opera.
She can also be heard and seen in Il Boemo, the biographical film about Czech composer Josef Mysliveček.
In August, Alpha will release yet another Baráth Cleopatra on a 3-CD set of Giacomelli’s Cesare in Egitto from last year’s Innsbruck Festival.
I apologize for the incomplete details below. I recently lost an important “cache” of such information, but I’ve done my best to fill in the blanks.
Handel: Arias and a Duet from Orlando, Admeto & Tamerlano
Orlando
Dorinda: Emőke Baráth
Conductor, location and date: ?
Admeto
Antigona: Emőke Baráth
Admeto: Sonia Prina
Conductor: Alan Curtis
Krakow 2014
Tamerlano
Asteria: Emőke Baráth
Conductor: Alexis Kossenko
Poznan festival, Poland 2014
Handel: Gloria, Cantata, excerpts from Dixit Dominus & Theodora
Gloria
Emőke Baráth
Conductor: Gyorgi Veshagyi
Hungary ?
Theodora
Theodora: Emőke Baráth
Conductor: György Vashegyi
Budapest 2021
Handel: Arias and a Duet from Rinaldo & Giulio Cesare
Rinaldo
Armida: Emőke Baráth
Rinaldo: Carlo Vistoli
Conductor: Naolly
Barcelona 2024
Giulio Cesare
Cleopatra: Emőke Baráth
Conductor: Andrea Marcon
Basel 2021
Mozart: Arias from Mitridate, Re di Ponto & Don Giovanni
Mitridate, Re di Ponto
Sifare: Emőke Baráth
Conductor: Lars Ulrik Mortensen
Copenhagen 2024
Don Giovanni
Donna Anna: Emőke Baráth
Conductor: Emmauelle Häim
Lille 2023
Vivaldi: Arias from Il Giustino
Il Giustino
Arianna: Emőke Baráth
Conductor: Ottavio Dantone
Madrid, 2025
J.S. Bach: Cantata arias and duets
Emőke Baráth
Maarten Engeltjes
Conductor (of some): György Vashegyi
Locations and dates: ?
Terradellas: Arias from La Merope
Merope: Emőke Baráth
Conductor: Francesco Corti
Madrid 2025
Each of today’s Emőke Baráth collections can be downloaded by clicking on the icon of a cloud with an arrow pointing downward on the audio player above and the resulting mp3 file will appear in your download directory.
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Christopher Corwin
Christopher Corwin began writing for parterre box in 2011 under the pen name “DeCaffarrelli.” His work has also appeared in , The New York Times, Musical America, The Observer, San Francisco Classical Voice and BAMNotes. Like many, he came to opera via the Saturday Met Opera broadcasts which he began listening to at age 11. His particular enthusiasm is 17th and 18th century opera. Since 2015 he has curated the weekly podcast Trove Thursday on parterre box presenting live recordings.
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Topics: chris's cache
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People: Emöke Baráth