This is very well worth hearing, but also far from complete. This fact is acknowledged by Jeremy Commons in his booklet note, though he claims that the content of the single disc is ‘sufficiently substantial and extended to give a very good idea of the nature of the opera as a whole’. Well, as long as we know. The main presentation (the box and the booklet cover and spine) will, I’m sure, lead many tosuppose that what they are buying is thewhole opera, and I doubt whether the word ‘essential’ printed in small letters to form the rim of a circle will be taken to indicatesomething in the nature of ‘highlights’.

The main point is nevertheless a positive one: Opera Rara has again performed a service that deserves all gratitude. For most who take an interest in such things, the name of mercadante will have passed in the last decade or so fromreference-book status to reality. At the same time admiration will have grown, and with it, interest. Zaira, given at Naples in 1831, was his first opera back in Italy after his years in Spain. Like the failed opera by Bellini (1829), it has a libretto by Felice Romani based on the tragedy by Voltaire: the story is one of true love in conflict with family and religious duty. Jeremy Commons sees it as a criticism of religion, in this case Christian, but all the principal characters are sympathetically created by their music, and their misfortunes are all the more moving for that.

Outstanding among the singers is Alastair Miles in the role of the enlightened Muslim king, in love with Zaira. The writing is for a high lyric bass with the skills of a thorough virtuoso. Miles is exemplary in the evenness and fluency of his scales and gruppetti, and the tessitura suits him admirably. Majella Cullagh rewards the confidence placed in her, and the well-known gifts of Bruce Ford and Gary Magee are also well employed. Orchestra and chorus do theircustomary good work and David Parry his.Mercadante deserves the last words. There are some fine arias here and some better duets and ensembles; but best of all is the integrity of the work as a whole – or of the generous portionof it provided here.