Search - Henry Purcell, The Scholars Baroque Ensemble, Sarah Connolly :: Purcell - Dido and Aeneas / The Scholars Baroque Ensemble

Intimate View of Well-known Opera

N. Chevalier | Regina, Sask. Canada | 04/05/2001

(4 out of 5 stars)

"The Scholars Baroque Ensemble offer a small-scale reading of Purcell's only opera, attempting to recreate the forces and allocation of voices that might have been heard at its first performance in a private girls' school. With only one peformer to each part, the result is a very small, initmate version of this often-recorded piece, making this not so much an opera as we are used to thinking of the term, but more a private family drama with music. The playing is superb and the recording itself first-rate. My only problem is with Kym Amps's Dido, which somehow lacks the depth needed to convey the full weight of the tragedy in such a stripped-down telling of the story. Compare her performance here to that of Emma Kirkby's, whose version of "When I am laid in earth" can bring me to tears, and you'll know what I mean. Still, I would place this recording alongside other period-performance recordings: at the budget price, it could be a supplement to another version of the opera, but it shouldn't be one's only experience of this amazing work."