What passion cannot Music raise and quell?
American Bach led a stirring rendition of Handel’s Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day, full of big questions and even bigger musical highlights.
handel
They don’t stoop to conquer
The countertenors conquer the day in Handel‘s Giulio Cesare in Egitto at the Deutsche Oper Berlin.
Hercules conquers Carnegie
William Guanbo Su and Ann Hallenberg are compelling in The English Concert’s presentation of Handel‘s Hercules at Carnegie Hall.
Baroque in the Bay Area
Under the baton of Nicholas McGegan, Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra & Chorale proves they have a magic touch in a program of Rameau and Handel.
Hear, O Israel
As Messiah season begins, Christopher Corwin reports on two of Handel’s forays into the Old Testament.
By Christopher Corwin
Comment
Sacred raptures cheer my breast
The English Concert’s annual Handel tour brings Solomon conducted by Harry Bicket to the US beginning Sunday March 5. In anticipation, Chris’s Cache offers Solomon plus four other oratorios by the master: Belshazzar, Hercules, Saul and Jephtha, all via broadcasts for which I feel a personal connection.
Mainly in the plain
I wonder why many New Yorkers have been led to believe that the only Handel conductor in the world is Harry Bicket.
Seria effect
While it must be admitted that Elza van den Heever doesn’t have an ideally warm and agile Handel voice, she evidenced fierce control over her instrument and skillfully built a powerful portrait of the courageous Rodelida fighting for her survival.
Ann-thology
Many New Yorkers think it’s the best bagel, but this week H&H names Trove Thursday’s bounteous anthology featuring the splendid long-running association between George Frideric Handel and Ann Hallenberg, his prime 21st century acolyte.
Castles made of sand
Jakub Józef Orlinski‘s “Stille amare” packed a lot of punch in terms of dramatic intensity.
Keep the Rome fires burning
Handel’s biting Agrippina finally arrived at the Metropolitan Opera Thursday evening 310 years after its Venetian premiere.
Thus let few thanks be paid
Kudos to Opera Philadelphia for programming Handel’s Semele in its exceptionally interesting and wide-ranging Festival 2019; unfortunately, despite an extraordinary cast, James Darrah’s drably dull production doomed it.
Made in the shade
Here’s a quick sprint through some recent (and a few maybe not-so-very-recent) Handel CDs that have been stacking up.
Not the Messiah
Four fine Handel-centric concerts from the Morgan Library to Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center proved a bracing antidote to pervasive Messiah-mania.
Garden variety
Amadigi di Gaula performed the Opera Settecento orchestra last Saturday night at St. George—Handel’s own parish church—fit perfectly into the venue.
Less than hero
Iestyn Davies’s theatrical blandness combined with his vocal unsuitability for the role left a hole at the center of Rinaldo.
Better call Saul
Director Barrie Kosky’s Glyndebourne 2015 production of Handel’s 1739 oratorio Saul (released on Opus Arte DVD) shows imagination as well as a strong cast and design team.
Notes from the underground
Director R.B. Schlather and his team explored Handel’s Orlando and the results, as seen at Monday night’s final presentation, proved uncommonly stimulating.
Isn’t it necromantic?
St. Paul’s Chapel is the perfect site for Saul, Handel’s finest dramatic oratorio.
Saxon violence
His shaved head in striking contrast to his dark beard and glinting eyes, the implacable Tartar conqueror glowers at us from the CD cover, while the uncropped photo of countertenor Xavier Sabata (above) is even more disturbing, featuring his raised fist and forearm tightly wrapped in a leather belt.
In witch we serve
Sunday afternoon’s intermittently involving concert performance of Handel’s Alcina at Carnegie Hall starred an unusually intense Joyce DiDonato as a powerful sorceress blinded by her romantic delusions.
About last night
For those who like their Handel loud, with no forfeit of baroque finesse, one promising solution is to make the hall smaller.
Twice on this island
Here’s a last-minute alert to a bit of baroque in downtown NYC: the project WhiteboxLab: SoundLounge will livestream performances of Handel’s Alcina tonight and tomorrow night (Sunday) starting each evening at 7:00 PM.
Theodora goes wild
Joined by the Choir of Trinity Wall Street, The English Concert concluded the US leg of its current tour at Carnegie Hall Sunday with a complete performance of the darkly moving Theodora, Handel’s penultimate oratorio.
I’ll take the fall
The days are getting shorter, but you can keep the prattle going this fall’s Talk of the Town! You will, you can, you must join in the discussion about: Great mezzo soprano performances (October),
Gained in translation (November), Teleport me back to… (December).
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