![Kathryn Lewek, John Chest, Il Pomo d'Oro, Francesco Corti - Handel: Apollo e Dafne, HWV 122 & Armida abbandonata, HWV 105 (2022) [Official Digital Download 24bit/96kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2022/02/28/d7vdo9g64f5nc_600.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
Kathryn Lewek, John Chest, Il Pomo d’Oro, Francesco Corti – Handel: Apollo e Dafne, HWV 122 & Armida abbandonata, HWV 105 (2022)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/96 kHz | Time – 01:12:25 minutes | 1,26 GB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © PentaTone
Compact cantatas with expressive depth. Il Pomo d’Oro and Francesco Corti present Handel’s Apollo e Dafne and Armida abbandonata, together with two outstanding vocalists: soprano Kathryn Lewek (Armida and Dafne) and baritone John Chest (Apollo). Handel composed these two cantatas shortly after his Italian sojourn (1706-1709), and they demonstrate his acquaintance with and aptitude for Italian operatic music. Compared to opera, supporting roles are left out of these relatively compact cantatas, increasing the focus on the main characters, and heightening the expressive depth of their music. Il Pomo d’Oro performs these pieces with historically-informed ears, lively and colourful. The cantatas alternate with several delightful orchestral pieces by Handel, including several movements from his Almira-Suite.
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![John Chest, Marcelo Amaral - Brahms: Die schöne Magelone, Op. 33 (2019) [Official Digital Download 24bit/88,2kHz] Download](https://i0.wp.com/imghd.xyz/images/2023/03/24/u78y1dy78bama_600.jpg?resize=500%2C500&ssl=1)
John Chest, Marcelo Amaral – Brahms: Die schöne Magelone, Op. 33 (2019)
FLAC (tracks) 24 bit/88,2 kHz | Time – 57:21 minutes | 941 MB | Genre: Classical
Studio Masters, Official Digital Download | Digital Booklet, Front Cover | © Alpha Classics
Alpha and the Festival of Aix-en-Provence continue their Young Talents series, in which Laureates of the Académie of the Aix Festival are each accorded an album. The American baritone John Chest enjoys a brilliant career that has already led him to Glyndebourne Festival and the BBC Proms. In partnership with the Brazilian pianist Marcelo Amaral, he presents Die schöne Magelone by Johannes Brahms. Among all the wealth of Lieder that Brahms composed, this is his only real song cycle. Brahms had known these popular tales since his childhood, but it was thanks to Schumann that he discovered the novel published in 1797 by Ludwig Tieck, entitled “The Love Story of the Fair Magelone and Count Peter of Provence”. The work is representative of the poetic, idealised reinvention of the Middle Ages so characteristic of German romanticism: stories of star-crossed love, that usually end happily… ‘What strikes the listener most of all is the song cycle’s epic scale – it is a veritable pocket opera, supported by pianistic writing of great complexity,’ writes Timothée Picard in the libretto accompanying this disc – which is illustrated by an original design by Maia Flore, a laurate photographer of the HSBC Foundation: her poetic universe has already featured in the preceding number of the series, “Black is the colour” (debut album of Anna Stéphany). – Alpha Classics
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