One of the most colourful works from Handel's time in Rome, La Resurrezione, rises again thanks to Emmanuelle Haim, Le Concert d'Astre and five exceptional singers.
Continuing the Handel series from Le Concert d'Astre and Emmanuelle Haim is La Resurrezione, composed during the young Handel's period in Rome and first performed there in 1708. The work recounts the events of Easter and the solo singers portray Lucifer, Mary Magdalene, an Angel, St John the Evangelist, and St Mary Cleophas.
It calls upon a large orchestra, led and directed at the first performance by the master violinist Arcangelo Corelli. The role of Mary Magdalene, here performed by the lush-voiced young British soprano (and EMI Classics artist) Kate Royal, was sung at the first performance by the celebrated Margherita Durastanti, even though the Pope had forbidden female singers to perform in public.
In April 2009, Emmanuelle Haim led a performance of La Resurrezione at London's Barbican Centre, part of a tour which also covered Paris, Dijon, Aix-en-Provence, Lille, Pamplona, Valladolid and Salzburg. The Guardian reported that: Emmanuelle Haim's understanding of the relationship between sense and sensuality in Handel has marked her out as one of his finest interpreters, and her performance with her own Concert d'Astr�e was notable for its immediacy and expression. The playing had touches of magic as recorders and flutes comforted the uncomprehending saints, and flaring brass heralded the arrival of a new dawn in Camilla Tilling's joyous Angel let fly volleys of flamboyant coloratura while the great Sonia Prina was vocally spectacular and immensely moving as Mary Cleophas.
The Salzburg performance led the Salzburger Nachrichten to describe the springy mastery of the ensemble, with sparkling accents from the trumpets, lute and gamba A Baroque highpoint in an Easter Festival dominated by Romanticism.Drehpunkt Kultur described Luca Pisaroni Lucifer as dangerously honed and Toby Spence as a master of subtle ornamentation. Overall, the ensemble of singers was technically and stylistically at the peak of today's Handel interpretation, while Haim herself knows how to ignite her ensemble to such powerful effect and then to restrain the emotion once more, so that the force of expression never runs wild.
This complements the judgement of Forum Opera on Haim's Virgin Classics recording of another Italian work by Handel, Il trionfo del tempo e del disinganno: Emmanuelle Haim favours the chamber dimension of the work in an interpretation that is balanced, vivid, refined but not precious lively, but never aggressive. She prefers the power of suggestion and this puts the music at an advantage: she breathes and lets things run their natural course. Isn't that the apogee of art? This Trionfo could become a classic./em>
Oratorio per la Resurrezione
di Nostro Signor Gesu Cristo
Libretto: Carlo Sigismondo Capece
HWV 47
Angelo Camilla Tilling soprano
Lucifero Luca Pisaroni bass-baritone
S. Maria Maddalena Kate Royal soprano
S. Maria Cleofe Sonia Prina contralto
S. Giovanni Evangelista Toby Spence tenor
Le Concert d'Astre Emmanuelle Haim harpsichord, organ, direction
