Scarlatti: Euridice dall'Inferno

Scarlatti (Artist, Composer), Ars Lyrica Houston (Artist), -- (Conductor) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Conductor: --
• Composer: Scarlatti
• Audio CD (March 31, 2009)
• SPARS Code: DDD
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Naxos
• ASIN: B001QUL732
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #360,688 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

For its Naxos début Ars Lyrica presents world première recordings of two of Alessandro Scarlatti's
vocal works: Euridice dall Inferno and La concettione della Beata Vergine. The Houston-based
early music ensemble has gained praise for its 'zestful music-making' (Houston Chronicle).
Its period instrument performances reveal the brilliance and depth of Scarlatti's expressive and
highly theatrical music, which is enjoying renewed interest as the composer becomes
increasingly recognised as the peer of Baroque masters such as Handel and Vivaldi.
Supplementing these are two equally accomplished instrumental pieces.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wow! An Excellent Performance ..., December 10, 2010

By 

Giordano Bruno (Wherever I am, I am.) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Scarlatti: Euridice dall'Inferno (Audio CD)

... worthy of any concert venue in Boston, San Francisco, Toronto, or Europe! Do I sound surprised? And if I confess to being surprised, does it make my chauvinism any more pardonable? Ars Lyrica Houston is a relatively young organization, founded in 1998 and still very much based in Texas. Most of the performers on this CD are moonlighting in the Baroque, with 'day' jobs in the Houston symphonic orchestras and opera companies, despite which their musicianship on this CD is convincingly HIPP (Historically Informed). None of the singers on this CD are familiar to me, and of the instrumentalists, only two: harpsichordist and director Matthew Dirst and lutenist Richard Savino, a longtime Bar Area performer. This is one of only two CDs from Ars Lyrica Houston available on amazon; the organization offers these and several earlier recording through it own website, by the way, and it would be a noble gesture of support to purchase them directly.

And what a bold stroke it was to program and record music by Alessandro Scarlatti (1669-1725), one of the greatest under-appreciated composers of his or any other era. Neither of the two vocal works on this CD have been recorded before, to my knowledge, and both are extraordinarily compact and polished examples of Scarlatti at his best. "Euridice dall'inferno" is comprised of three pairs of recitativo/aria for soprano with only basso continuo (cello, lute harpsichord) accompaniment, expressing Eurydice's hope and anguish in the Underworld awaiting Orpheus. The "Oratorio sopra la Concettione della Beata Vergine" -- Oratorio on the Conception of the Blessed Virgin" is a far more complex composition, both musically and theologically. It's a conscious promotion of the doctrine of Mary's immaculate conception, as proclaimed in 1708 by Scarlatti's old friend Pope Clement XI, previously known as Giovanni Albani, a member with Scarlatti of the Arcadian Academy founded by Queen Christina of Sweden. The characters in this 'opera in the oratory' are the Archangel Michael (soprano Melissa Givens), Grace (countertenor Gerrod Pagenkopf), The Serpent (basso Timothy Jones) and Heresy (tenor Joseph Gaines). Obviously, it's two against two, with the outcome theologically preordained. The thirty-minute oratorio contains several musically rich duets and trios expressing the dramatic conflict, plus the usual recitativo/aria sequences. There are some musicological issues about this work, the music of which seems to have been recycled from an earlier lost oratorio, but you won't be bothered by such matters when you hear this confident performance, which includes elegant obbligatos for two violins and cello, along with the double-bass-fortified continuo.

Mathew Dirst plays Scarlatti's Toccata in A major for harpsichord as a brief interlude. His instrument is exceptionally well recorded, and his playing is faultless. Possibly the most thrilling composition on the CD, however, is the Cello Sonata #2 in C minor, performed spectacularly by Barrett Sills on an authentic baroque cello, supported by lute, harpsichord, and violone. Rather few purely instrumental works by Alessandro Scarlatti have survived; this sonata is expressive enough to make us long for more.

Ars Lyrica Houston's 2010 performance of Hasse's opera "Marc Antonio et Cleopatra" is the other release available on amazon, or from their website. I rushed to order it as soon as I finished listening to this one.