Gluck La rencontre imprévue
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: Christoph Gluck
Genre:
Opera
Label: Orfeo
Magazine Review Date: 12/1992
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 101
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: C242912H
Tracks:
| Composition | Artist Credit |
|---|---|
| (La) Rencontre imprévue |
Christoph Gluck, Composer
Annegeer Stumphius, Dardane, Soprano Anne-Marie Rodde, Amine Christoph Gluck, Composer Claes-Håkan Ahnsjö, Osmin, Tenor Iris Vermillion, Balkis, Soprano Jan-Hendrik Rootering, Calender, Bass Jolanta Kaufman, Rezia, Soprano Leopold Hager, Conductor Malcolm Walker, Vertigo, Baritone Munich Radio Orchestra Paolo Orecchia, Chef de Caravane, Bass Robert Gambill, Ali, Tenor Ulrich Ress, Sultan, Tenor |
Author: Stanley Sadie
La recontre imprevue belongs, along with works by Haydn and Mozart, to an eighteenth-century tradition of 'Turkish' works in which a Sultan or Pasha, after threatening all kinds of tortures, magnanimously frees the beautiful Western lady and her lover who were trying to escape from his harem. Of these, Mozart's is the latest and the most serious; Gluck's little opera-comique, written in 1764 at the end of the Viennese vogue for that genre, is an altogether slighter piece, with several comic characters singing lines like ''Castagno, castagna, pistafanache'' (here 'translated' as ''Conker, bonker, treacly trail'') or ''Coui, coui, coui, tri, tri, tri'', and short airs in a very direct and simple style: this, two years after Orfeo! Only the central character, Ali, gets music on a higher plane, with some very eloquent little arias that give scope for graceful legato at the top of the tenor compass. Ali, believing his beloved Rezia dead, resists the amorous blandishments of three beauties she sends to test him; then Rezia and he, escaping, are betrayed by the Calendar, but of course spared along with most of the secondary characters.
Leopold Hager conducts a lively performance here, with brisker tempos and sharper articulation than he generally provides in his Mozart recordings. Here and there, however, the manner is a little lush for this kind of music, which would have benefited from performance by the acute-toned strings of a period-instrument group in place of the rather sumptuous sound of these Muncheners. Still, it is by the singing that the performance stands or falls, and this one stands pretty well. The tenor Robert Gambill, though sometimes tested by the high tessitura—he can't easily sing quietly and gracefully up there—produces some very beguiling sounds and appealing phrasing; there is one really delectable air, very French in manner, in Act 1 with cor anglais and bassoon and solo violin passages too, and in the next act ''Ah, que vos plaintes'' is uncommonly lovely. Julie Kaufman sings very touchingly in ''Maitre de coeurs'', the most appealing of her airs, but I should have liked a Rezia who brings a little more expressive weight to the role, setting it apart from the lesser ones. Malcolm Walker makes a resonant Vertigo, without sounding too convincing in French; Jan-Hendrick Rootering sings with some distinction in the Calendar's role.
The rival Erato set is rather more idiomatically conducted, by John Eliot Gardiner; he has the advantage of a superior Rezia in Lynne Dawson but Guy de Mey is a less persuasive Ali. There is little to choose in the lesser roles. On balance the Gardiner set is slightly the more persuasive, all round, but the attractive portrayal of the central role here is a point in favour of this new set.'
Leopold Hager conducts a lively performance here, with brisker tempos and sharper articulation than he generally provides in his Mozart recordings. Here and there, however, the manner is a little lush for this kind of music, which would have benefited from performance by the acute-toned strings of a period-instrument group in place of the rather sumptuous sound of these Muncheners. Still, it is by the singing that the performance stands or falls, and this one stands pretty well. The tenor Robert Gambill, though sometimes tested by the high tessitura—he can't easily sing quietly and gracefully up there—produces some very beguiling sounds and appealing phrasing; there is one really delectable air, very French in manner, in Act 1 with cor anglais and bassoon and solo violin passages too, and in the next act ''Ah, que vos plaintes'' is uncommonly lovely. Julie Kaufman sings very touchingly in ''Maitre de coeurs'', the most appealing of her airs, but I should have liked a Rezia who brings a little more expressive weight to the role, setting it apart from the lesser ones. Malcolm Walker makes a resonant Vertigo, without sounding too convincing in French; Jan-Hendrick Rootering sings with some distinction in the Calendar's role.
The rival Erato set is rather more idiomatically conducted, by John Eliot Gardiner; he has the advantage of a superior Rezia in Lynne Dawson but Guy de Mey is a less persuasive Ali. There is little to choose in the lesser roles. On balance the Gardiner set is slightly the more persuasive, all round, but the attractive portrayal of the central role here is a point in favour of this new set.'
Gluck La rencontre imprévue
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