(Photo: Anna Kolata) “Amadigi di Gaula” was from Händel’s early London period. Like the much more famous earlier “Rinaldo,” “Amadigi” is steeped in magic, passion, and deception—its narrative shaped by baroque fantasy and underpinned by musical material recycled from Händel’s years on the continent. It is therefore fitting that this 2024 production was revived for this year’s Händel Festival in {…}
(Photo: Thomas Ziegler) The Leopoldina in Halle, seat of Germany’s oldest scientific academy, offered a rare confluence of setting and sound. Outside, summer plants stirred in the breeze and lavender bloomed along the garden paths. Inside, the classical Festsaal was filled with an attentive audience. In the foyer beyond the hall, portraits of centuries of scholars looked on—silent witnesses to {…}
(Photo: Thomas Ziegler) Among the lesser-known gems presented at this year’s Halle Handel Festival, Alessandro Scarlatti’s “La Santissima Annunziata” stood out for its spiritual focus and musical refinement. Composed around 1700/1703 and revived in 1708 under the patronage of Prince Ruspoli, this early Roman oratorio—with a libretto attributed to Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni—offers a deeply meditative take on the Annunciation. Unlike {…}
(Photo: Thomas Ziegler) Händel’s 1731 opera “Poro, re dell’Indie,” his 28th opera seria, initially proved to be a success, knocking up an initial run of 16 performances at the King’s Theatre, London, followed by revivals in the city as well as productions in Hamburg and Braunschweig. Even before the composer’s death in 1759, however, it had disappeared completely from theatres {…}
(Photo credit: Matthias Horn) “Agrippina” from the Händel Festival 2025, is a glittering, cynical comedy of ambition, soaked in psychological warfare. This production plunges Agrippina into a dazzling contemporary world that is as intriguing as its Roman origins. Director Walter Sutcliffe and set designer Aleksandar Denic have boldly reimagined the Roman Senate as the glittering interior of a Las Vegas-style {…}
(Photo: Benjamin Elsholz) In the Goethe-Theater of Bad Lauchstädt—Germany’s only fully preserved Goethe-era theater—Handel’s “Clori, Tirsi e Fileno” received a rare and refreshingly focused staging. Composed around 1707 for unknown purpose, this pastoral cantata, though small in scale, hints at operatic intensity. In this performance by three exceptional young singers under Michael Hofstetter, its elegant construction emerged as both theatrically {…}