Search - Claudio Monteverdi, Ivor Bolton, Bayerischen Staatsorchester :: Monteverdi - L'incoronazione di Poppea / Antonacci, Daniels, Moll, Bolton (Munich Opera Festival 1997)

Passionate Live Performance

Jan Cambria | Cambria, CA USA | 05/16/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Vibrant performances by Daniels, Antonacci, Moll, et al. To quote Giles' 1998 Opera News review: the "performance shimmers with the musical and erotic excitement the work demands..." Much credit goes to conductor Ivor Bolton. Farao has produced this in excellent ambient sound. And provides an actual booklet with libretto & essays in English translation."

Monteverdi Masterwork Led by Fearless Antonacci and Daniels

Ed Uyeshima | San Francisco, CA USA | 09/12/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is an unheralded masterpiece recorded in a live 1997 performance. The 1643 opera is clearly the work of a master who had thoroughly transcended the Italian style of Verdi, embedding lyricism within the conversational recitatives developed by his Florentine colleagues. With his final work, Claudio Monteverdi uses his highly expressive recitatives as seamless bridges to an unusual number of closed forms-from laments to lullabies to love songs. Conductor Ivor Bolton effectively uses a small ensemble - only five string players and a barrage of continuo instruments--lute, guitar, harp, two harpsichords, organ, chitarrone, and viola da gamba - played wonderfully by members of the Bavarian State Orchestra. But he manages to generate some real fire in this classic tale of amorality, and he has a wonderful cast that fans the embers memorably.



In the central roles of Poppea and Nerone, the illicit lovers, Italian mezzo-soprano Anna Caterina Antonacci and American countertenor David Daniels (in one of his first recordings) are charismatic and expressive, as they fearlessly pursue their lust for power. If, like me, your only picture of Poppea is Claudette Colbert bathing provocatively in asses' milk in Cecil B. DeMille's Sign of the Cross, then you are in for a treat. The character of Poppea employs every trick in her arsenal, from a languid, sensual wheedling to pouting, teasing insistence. Her wiles have their intended effect, and Nerone is smitten to say the least as he promises to exile his wife, Ottavia, from Rome. The duets sung by Antonacci and Daniels contain some of the most meltingly beautiful moments you're likely to hear in opera, and the fact that both roles are taken by high voices allows them to blend together indistinguishably, a perfect representation of two bodies and souls entwining. Among many highlights, Daniels excels on Nerone's concluding aria, the regal "Ascendi, o mia diletta". His future stardom seems assured from this auspicious beginning.



The supporting cast is superb. Ottavia is nicely sung by mezzo-soprano Nadja Michael to bring out audience sympathy with earnestness. She does a particularly nice turn on "Addio, Roma", an extraordinary lament which begins with repeated, heartrending sobs on the first syllable, separated by rests, before she can finally put the two words together. Another barrier to the lovers' union comes in the form of Nerone's tutor, Seneca, portrayed in a robust performance by bass Kurt Moll, filled with nobility and morality, the two traits that incidentally get the character killed. In their confrontation, Nerone begins by matching Seneca's measured, reasonable arguments aphorism-for-aphorism, but soon dissolves into petulant threats and insults, and Daniels is amazing in the way he captures irregular phrase lengths and jagged musical lines that make him sound like a spoiled, impulsive child.



As was common practice back then, Monteverdi adorns his serious work with a gallery of comic characters. The most notable of these is Poppea's nurse, Arnalta, a travesty role scored for a tenor. "She" serves as confidante and helpmate to Poppea's scheme and is not without ambitions of "her" own. Countertenor Dominique Visse sings this role effectively in alternate strokes of campiness and tenderness. Fellow countertenor Alex Köhler's Ottone seems appropriately clownish with his sniveling manner, and soprano Dorothea Röschmann makes for an especially energetic Drusilla, full of life and commanding the warmth of tone required when the character is cruelly tested and not found wanting. My one quibble is that the recording does have an echo chamber effect at times, mostly forgivable since it is a live recording. Regardless, this is a masterful recording."