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Véronique Gens, Münchner Rundfunkorchester, Hervé Niquet – Visions (2017)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 55:41 minutes | 936 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Alpha Classics
After an album of French songs (Néère) that earned her a “Gramophone Award” in 2016, Véronique Gens presents her new recital, this time with orchestra, which gives her an opportunity to display the maturity of her ‘Falcon’ soprano, the central tessitura typical of French Romantic opera, which takes its name from Cornélie Falcon, who created the works of Meyerbeer and Halévy staged in the 1830s. She pays tribute here to a number of composers whose unknown operas she was the first to reveal in projects mounted by the Palazzetto Bru Zane, including David, Godard, Saint-Saëns and Halévy. The programme selects arias from all the genres in vogue in the Romantic era: opera (Saint-Saëns, Halévy, Godard, Février), opéra-comique (David), oratorio (Franck, Massenet) and the cantata for the Prix de Rome (Bizet, Bruneau). A nod to Wagner and his Tannhäuser – in its French translation of the 1860s – completes this programme conducted by a longstanding colleague of the soprano, one of the leading specialists in French music, Hervé Niquet.
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Orchestre de chambre de Paris & Hervé Niquet – Massenet: Songs with Orchestra (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:06:38 minutes | 1,14 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Bru Zane
Massenet was not only the composer of Manon and Werther. In the shadow of his stage works slumber many mélodies decked out in subtle and delicate orchestrations, which we are delighted to revive here. These previously unrecorded works have been entrusted to a team of first-rate artists, most of them fervent champions of French poetry and its musical settings.
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Orchestre de chambre de Paris, Hervé Niquet, Flemish Radio Choir – Halévy: La Reine de Chypre (2018)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/88,2 kHz | Time – 02:34:38 minutes | 2,47 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Front Cover | © Bru Zane
Berlioz wrote of Halévy’s La Reine de Chypre (1841): ‘Its success will at least equal that of La Juive. And Wagner added: ‘It is in La Reine de Chypre that Halévy’snew style hasappeared with themost brilliance and success.’ So several voices – and those by no means insignificant – have declared thiswork,written six years after LaJuive, to be its composer’s masterpiece. Premiered on 22 December 1841, Halévy’s opera offered the limelight to Rosine Stoltz in the title role: she was the only woman in the cast, for it had been found preferable to isolate her, following her incessant disputes with the other female singers in the company. Alongside her, the tenor Gilbert Duprez shone in the role of Gérard. The story takes the spectator on a voyage from the palaces of Venice to those of Cyprus. But despite an initial succe ss confirmed by seve ral translations and adaptations that appeared shortly after the first run (notably Lachner’s Caterina Cornaro in 1841 and Donizetti’s in 1843), the work gradually vanished from European opera houses.
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Orchestre de l’opéra de Rouen Normandie, Chœur du Concert Spirituel, Hervé Niquet – Saint-Saëns: Phryné (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:04:28 minutes | 1,15 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © Bru Zane
To mark the centenary of the death of Camille Saint-Saëns, the Palazzetto Bru Zane offers a chance to discover one of his most performed and admired operas in his lifetime, presented here in a rare version. Completed in 1893 and premiered the same year at the Opéra-Comique, the piece amusingly recounts the love affair between Nicias and Phryné, who dupes the old archon Dicephilus in order to avenge his cruelty. Its witty melodies and delightful orchestration made the opera an immediate success in Paris and then throughout France. It was enriched with recitatives composed by André Messager in 1896 to promote its career in theatres abroad.
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