Getting at Handel's operas and oratorios

Started by Tancata, July 10, 2007, 01:25:37 PM

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DarkAngel

#620
I found some youtube vids of Orlando........actually I may have to get that from netflix also :D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hoowG6KzA3U&feature=PlayList&p=0E4889E127CDA71F&index=2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BXmqsQxKyw&feature=PlayList&p=0E4889E127CDA71F&index=3
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhwP9bDeKag&feature=related

Marijana Mijanovic is familiar to me from the excellent Vivaldi Bajazet opera CD Biondi/Virgin
She has very expressive facial movements and a natural tomboy appearance which helps when you are playing a male role
in baroque operas.......

DavidW

Wow DarkAngel she is very expressive! :o 

It's funny I was wondering if it would be like those Shakespeare--WWII modernizations, and yup that looks like it, and I now checked and it's WWI. :D  Well I'm still interested, those looking for strictly period piece would likely pass but I look forward to it. :)

DarkAngel

For some strange reason I could not take my eyes off the "action" in 2nd middle video.............. >:D

DavidW

Quote from: DarkAngel on September 20, 2009, 06:20:32 PM
For some strange reason I could not take my eyes off the "action" in 2nd middle video.............. >:D

Yeah that's a hot nurse, seems almost like a setup for a porno... ;D

:D

Elgarian

Quote from: DarkAngel on September 20, 2009, 04:43:48 PM
best Handel opera DVD I have seen is: (also available at Netflix)



Message to DavidW: Just adding my opinion to DA's. This is not just the best Handel opera DVD I've seen. It's one of the two or three best opera DVDs by anyone I've ever seen. It is seriously amazing.

DavidW

Quote from: Elgarian on September 21, 2009, 12:59:47 AM
Message to DavidW: Just adding my opinion to DA's. This is not just the best Handel opera DVD I've seen. It's one of the two or three best opera DVDs by anyone I've ever seen. It is seriously amazing.

Alright I've added it to my queue. :)

Elgarian

I was walking by the river this afternoon - a lovely afternoon with a warm wind, blue sky, and clouds like cauliflower tops, and I found myself very conscious of a kind of synthesis of music, art, and nature that's been developing while I've been listening to Handel's Italian cantatas, operas and so on. The works that have attracted me most have tended to be the predominantly Arcadian works - Acis & Galatea, the pastoral passages from L'Allegro, and a whole bunch of the cantatas. While this has been going on over several months, I've also been dipping into books on Claude Lorrain, and a newly acquired one on Poussin:

                   

And while all this has been going on, I've been regularly doing another favourite pursuit - walking by the river.

What I'm finding is that all three of these activities are becoming intertwined in a delectable and increasingly satisfying way. The music feeds the imaginative response to the paintings. The paintings create a shift in my perception of the river and the valley and the trees and the fields. They in turn feed me with imagined landscapes when I listen to, or recall, the music. The real valley, coloured and mythicised by the Poussin landscapes, becomes a backdrop for an imagined enactment of Acis & Galatea, in which the mythical characters merge with, or personify or animate the landscape, and so the process goes on, with the music feeding the art, and the art feeding the response to the valley, and then that feeds back into the music, in an endless loop.

I'm not sure what I can conclude from all this, except to observe that with this tripartite intertwinement going on, any notion of 'absolute music', or of the arts being independent of each other, goes right out of the window. And in this context, those lovely cantatas - which some might describe as 'artificial' constructs - take their place as a perfectly harmonious component of an imagined, mythicised naturalism; so that a simple thing like a walk by the river can become a deeply enriching, and almost visionary experience of nature, art and music all in one.


DarkAngel

Elgarian......I see you have acquired the good habit of observing the world around you, a wonderful harmonius cycle
nature > music > imagination...........all building upon each other

Life is good and we are here only a short time, we celibrate its beauty and sing the praises musical arts here at this forum.
Many people are too focussed with lifes probelms to enjoy the beauty of simple things all around them.




DarkAngel

#628
My angel Danielle DeNiese in full flight, live outdoor performance at intimate Princes Canal Concert with very small orchestra 8/2009. Love her boundless energy and infectious joy, a pure delight watching this artist........17 yr old trumpeter also pretty good (shouldn't he be at home getting ready for school tomorrow)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjRnHrYbJ8g&feature=related

Many other videos from same concert available, I will have to see if a Blue Ray version of this becomes available   :D

Elgarian

Quote from: DarkAngel on September 24, 2009, 12:57:29 PM
My angel Danielle DeNiese in full flight, live outdoor performance at intimate Princes Canal Concert with very small orchestra 8/2009. Love her boundless energy and infectious joy, a pure delight watching this artist........17 yr old trumpeter also pretty good (shouldn't he be at home getting ready for school tomorrow)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjRnHrYbJ8g&feature=related

Many other videos from same concert available, I will have to see if a Blue Ray version of this becomes available   :D

Oh great. Thanks for this DA. She is the ultimate performer, isn't she? She injects life and vibrancy into everything she touches. Even when, sometimes, I find myself wanting perhaps a more subtle approach, I can't help smiling and giving in, and just going along with the ride. And that trumpet certainly rocks, doesn't it?

And, as somebody shouts at the end: 'Yeah!'

DavidW


DarkAngel

#631
Quote from: DavidW on September 24, 2009, 02:32:24 PM
I like that Dark Angel, this was one is also wonderful--

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GssMS-fypiU

:)

Oh yes, Danni can melt your heart also................


Coopmv

Quote from: DarkAngel on September 23, 2009, 04:20:33 PM
Elgarian......I see you have acquired the good habit of observing the world around you, a wonderful harmonius cycle
nature > music > imagination...........all building upon each other

Life is good and we are here only a short time, we celibrate its beauty and sing the praises musical arts here at this forum.
Many people are too focussed with lifes probelms to enjoy the beauty of simple things all around them.





Elgarian needs to listen to this recording to enjoy even better harmony ...

;D


Elgarian

Quote from: Coopmv on September 26, 2009, 09:27:38 AM
Elgarian needs to listen to this recording to enjoy even better harmony ...

I'm sure there's a good deal of harmony in there for you and others, Coop, but sadly I'm very unlikely to rush to buy anything by Pinnock in the near future: I just can't get into his Mozart symphonies despite trying hard and for some time. I'm sure they're very worthy, but just not for me. It's built up into a kind of prejudice - a bit like the problem you have with Jacobs, which we once talked about. So purely personally speaking, I'd be looking for blacksmithing harmony somewhere else.

Coopmv

#634
Quote from: Elgarian on September 26, 2009, 10:53:14 AM
I'm sure there's a good deal of harmony in there for you and others, Coop, but sadly I'm very unlikely to rush to buy anything by Pinnock in the near future: I just can't get into his Mozart symphonies despite trying hard and for some time. I'm sure they're very worthy, but just not for me. It's built up into a kind of prejudice - a bit like the problem you have with Jacobs, which we once talked about. So purely personally speaking, I'd be looking for blacksmithing harmony somewhere else.

But it is Handel we have been discussing.  I do not own any Pinnock's Mozart recordings and do not intend to get any either.   OTOH, Hogwood's Mozart recordings are actually quite good.

I still have not bought into Minkowski.  I prefer Alan Curtis over Minkowski by a very wide margin.  But Alan Curtis is no new discovery for me, as I bought quite a number of his early Handel's operas on LP in the early to mid 80's, which have been largely forgotten, sitting on the shelves and collecting dust.  I think I am now pretty close to owning every Handel opera CD set recorded by Curtis.

Elgarian

Quote from: Coopmv on September 26, 2009, 02:25:41 PM
But it is Handel we have been discussing.

Indeed. I wasn't suggesting my prejudice was reasonable; just that it's there, and affects my choices.

Coopmv

Quote from: Elgarian on September 26, 2009, 11:36:14 PM
Indeed. I wasn't suggesting my prejudice was reasonable; just that it's there, and affects my choices.

IMO, John Eliot Gardiner is the only one of the three English HIP conductors from the 80's - Gardiner, Hogwood and Pinnock, who has successfully transformed himself into conductor of classical and romantic works which have been well received.  While Pinnock's Haydn may be fine but I would not try his Mozart.  Hogwood's Beethoven cycle was a bit of a mixed bag, though his Mozart recordings have been well received.

knight66

You are forgeting about Norrington who is increasingly gaining critical approval for his movement into the Romantic and Classical repertoire.

Mike
DavidW: Yeah Mike doesn't get angry, he gets even.
I wasted time: and time wasted me.

Coopmv

Quote from: knight on September 27, 2009, 10:39:17 AM
You are forgeting about Norrington who is increasingly gaining critical approval for his movement into the Romantic and Classical repertoire.

Mike

You have a point there.  I only have 2 CD recordings by Norrington, his Beethoven 9th on EMI and his Purcell's Fairy Queen.  I really was not too overwhelmed by his Beethoven 9th, which I bought in the early 90's.  What are some of his defining recordings?

knight66

I think his Berlioz Symphonie is first rate. He has had some mixed reviews for some Bruckner recently, but even those who were not convinced said it was fascinating music making. I also read a good review of his Holst Planets. Mainly though I think his increased reputation arises from his increasing range of concert work.

Mike
DavidW: Yeah Mike doesn't get angry, he gets even.
I wasted time: and time wasted me.