Name: Handel: Serse
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Köhler stages the emotional rollercoaster of the first two acts around a huge dining table…The idea of the broken feast perfectly captures the disruptive nature of Xerxes’s tyranny…Arquez is... — BBC Music Magazine, Christmas Issue 2018, 4 out of 5 stars More…

Release Date: 14th Sep 2018
Catalogue No: 748004
Label: C Major

Handel: Serse

Gaëlle Arquez (Xerxes), Elizabeth Sutphen (Romilda), Lawrence Zazzo (Arsamene), Louise Alder (Atalanta), Tanja Ariane Baumgartner (Amastre), Thomas Faulkner (Elviro), Brandon Cedel (Ariodate)
Oper Frankfurt
Constantinos Carydis, Tilmann Köhler

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Xerxes is one of Handel’s latest and most frequently performed operas, famous for its marvelous opening aria ‘Ombra mai fu’. At the centre of the confusing tragicomedy, very loosely based upon the life of Xerxes I of Persia, is a powerful and lovesick royal eccentric, King Xerxes. Rising opera star Gaëlle Arquez in the title role of Xerxes ‘scintillates with her nimble, luminous mezzo-soprano’, singing ‘irresistibly beautiful, impassioned, furious – but never mean’ (Frankfurter Rundschau). Frankfurt’s excellent Opera and Museum Orchester contributes ‘all sorts of refinements’ to this ‘musical smash hit’ (Deutschlandfunk) and ‘In Frankfurt Tilman Köhler ensures a three-hour short abundant and furious banquett … a great evening of opera’ (Deutschlandfunk).

Reviews

Christmas Issue 2018

Köhler stages the emotional rollercoaster of the first two acts around a huge dining table…The idea of the broken feast perfectly captures the disruptive nature of Xerxes’s tyranny…Arquez is magnificent as Xerxes, and Elizabeth Sutphen makes a touching Romilda, feisty as well as tender. For once the put-upon Arsamene has an inner life of his own with the countertenor Lawrence Zazzo making a feast of his Act II aria ‘Quella che tutte fè’. In the pit Constantinos Carydis never lets pace of musical imagination flag.

December 2018

While the director plays up the elements of chaos…and incipient cruelty, his modern-dress staging, complete with video-installations, is theatrically compelling and psychologically convincing. In a uniformly fine, camera-friendly cast, all the singers throw themselves with gusto into their roles and interact vividly…Arquez rightly dominates, vocally and dramatically…Carydis’s direction, always responsive to the singers, meshes well with the production.

Opera Now November 2018

Tilmann Köhler’s modern dress production is another instance of video installation, this time blending the cast, which meets around a long table, with film of the same. It is a bravura production with a cast to match. Gaëlle Arquez is a smoothly focused Xerxes, Louise Alder and Elizabeth Sutphen divide the abundant soprano honours, Lawrence Zazzo’s countertenor contrasts well with Tanja Ariane Baumgartner’s explosive mezzo, and Brandon Cedel anchors things with a firm bass. Constantinos Carydis conducts with pliancy and energy.

Classical CD Review April 2019

Video is outstanding and the multi-channel audio works well. A fine issue, the first DVD of this major Handel opera.

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