“This is a glorious recording that made a huge impression on me in my early twenties. It is so completely filled with unbridled joy and dynamism, you can feel everyone in the ensemble playing with a beaming smile.
Coupled with that, a glowing intensity and commitment manifested in that Rolls-Royce TEC sound. Listen to the overture and I promise you won’t stop – my iPod had this on loop (and nothing else) for a fortnight or more.
And Mozart’s arrangement of this treasured work of Handel’s is brilliant. Using expanded forces, he creates a masterful veneer of colour with layers of additional part-writing that are always inventive, often cheeky and sometimes downright hilarious. Listen, for example, to how he deploys the bassoons in ‘Schäfer, was suchst du so ängstlich?’ .
One can’t help but giggle in a manner that is, I imagine, wholly incompatible with effective double reed playing. Alberto Grazzi and Sally Jackson: chapeau!“
The English Concert return to North America with a major Handel opera project. This time, the lesser-known Hercules HWV60, directed by Harry Bicket, a noted interpreter of the work.
When Rinaldo premiered in 1711, it cemented Handel at the forefront of London’s operatic landscape. To this day, it remains one of his most-revered works. Harry Bicket and The English Concert will be joined by an outstanding cast for an international presentation of Rinaldo in October.
