(Photo: Anna Kolata) History is not entirely devoid of female composers. Similarly, history books readily note reigning monarchs who successfully wielded the musical quill. Yet, the convergence of the two remains an exceedingly rare phenomenon. Under the baton of Attilio Cremonesi, the Handel Festival Orchestra Halle brought this rarity to vibrant life. Their performance of Maria Antonia Walpurgis’s 1760 opera {…}
(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 {…}
(Credit: Innsbruck Festival of Early Music official website) The Innsbruck Festival of Early Music has announced its 2022 season, featuring three operas and a number of concerts. For the purpose of this article we will focus on the vocal works. Here is a full slate. Operas Carl Heinrich Graun’s opera “Silla” spotlights Bejun Mehta, Eleonora Bellocci, Valer Sabadus, Roberta Invernizzi, {…}
The final opera of this year’s Innsbruck’s Festival for Early Music was “La Semele, o sia la richiesta fatale,” written in 1726 by the relatively unknown German composer, Johann Adolf Hasse, to a libretto by Francesco Ricciardi. Technically this is not an opera as such, but a serenata, although it could certainly fall within its ambit. Deriving from the Classical and {…}