When I interviewed Roger Parker for an article on Opera Rara in the July 2018 Gramophone he spoke enthusiastically of Il paria, which the company was planning to record: ‘full of invention’, he said, ‘with Beethovenian writing for the orchestra’. And here it is, in a new edition by Parker himself, Opera Rara’s Artistic Dramaturge, and Ian Schofield.

Il paria (pronounced like ‘aria’) was premiered on January 12, 1829, at the Teatro San Carlo in Naples. The cast included Rubini and Lablache, two members of what was to become known as the Puritani quartet; Neala was sung by Adelaide Tosi, who went on to star in Donizetti’s Il castello di Kenilworth six months later. The singers were warmly received, but the opera was not a success and it disappeared after six performances. Bits of the score were incorporated into later operas: in his authoritative booklet note Parker cites Anna Bolena, among others, and the unfinished opera for Paris, Le duc d’Albe. Despite his avowed intention early on to rework the opera, Donizetti clearly came to regard it as a dead duck.

The story is set in and around the Temple of Brahma in Benares, the city where to this day the dead are cremated on the banks of the Ganges. According to Parker, the Pariah of the title is Zarete; but it could equally well be his son Idamore who, concealing his lowly origins, is a victorious general fighting on behalf of the high-caste Brahmins. Their high priest is Akebare; his daughter Neala, a priestess, loves – and is loved by – Idamore. Akebare is jealous of Idamore and seeks to destroy him. The wedding of the lovers is interrupted by the discovery of Zarete, whose presence pollutes the ceremony. Idamore is revealed as a Pariah, and Akebare condemns all three to death.

So there are elements familiar to us from Norma and Aida, not to mention The Pearl Fishers and Lakmé, all of which lay in the future. The music is splendid, well worth discovering. But I must confess that, despite reading both synopsis and libretto several times, I found the plot quite baffling. Not the events themselves, which are clear enough, but the motivation. How does Akebare hope to advance his interests by announcing that the gods have decreed his daughter’s marriage to the hated Idamore? Why does Neala write to Idamore that her father is offering her hand to someone she doesn’t know?

Best to put these questions aside and turn to the music. One surprise is that both acts culminate in an ensemble for the soloists without the chorus. Another is the richness of the orchestration. Idamore’s cavatina is introduced by a long passage for woodwind accompanied by triplets in the strings; trombones interject his reading of Neala’s letter. The cantabile section begins with a cello solo, the strings playing pizzicato. Zerete’s scena in Act 2 opens with an even longer, delicate prelude for horn, woodwind and, again, pizzicato strings.

Mark Elder conducts with his customary zeal. Subtlety, too: as an example of his ear for detail, note the crescendo in the cellos and basses as Idamore tries to comfort Neala (disc 2, track 3). Albina Shagimuratova is superb: so delicate in the melisma on ‘tanto’ as she recounts a dream, so vivid in the syncopation of ‘No, la vita’. Akebare doesn’t have an aria but Marko Mimica makes a strong impression from the outset, his voice pleasingly reminiscent of Samuel Ramey’s. As Zarete, Misha Kiria struggles a bit with the low notes, but he is thrilling when he sings out. René Barbera is breathtakingly wonderful. In the cabaletta of his big aria he negotiates the repeated descent from what Roger Parker calls ‘the forest of high C sharps’ without yodelling, then caps it all with a ringing top E at the cadence. The Britten Sinfonia respond to Elder’s conducting with playing of great sensitivity and beauty. Indeed, the whole venture makes a fine conclusion to his seven years as Opera Rara’s Artistic Director.