HANDEL: FLAVIO

Early Opera Company, conducted by Christian Curnyn
Chaconne CHAN 0773(2)
****

There must be recordings of almost a hundred Handel operas lying about here and there, not counting multiple versions of the most popular; but happily that does not mean that there is not always room for one more – in this case for Flavio, which despite a rather dark plot is musically extremely light-hearted.

The libretto of Flavio was quickly knocked together by Nicola Haym, one of the jobbing librettists often used by Handel, from an earlier work by Alessandro Scarlatti. The plot concerns Teodata, daughter of one of the counsellors of King Flavio, and her lover Vitige. Unfortunately for them, Flavio fancies Teodata something rotten and spends most of the opera chasing after her, causing Vitige intense spasms of jealousy. Then there is Teodata’s brother Guido, betrothed to Emilia, the daughter of another counsellor, Lotario. What with one thing and another, the respective fathers fall out and there is a duel in which Lotario is killed.

Not, you may think, a load of laughs, and one wonders what caused Handel to write so much delightfully entertaining music for it. He may, like his colleagues, have been seriously worried by the runaway success of The Beggers’ Opera, for which the town was deserting more serious offerings. But that need not concern us: the point is that we have a virtually unknown Handel opera full of fine, inventive, melodious music, and performed with remarkable brio by the Early Opera Company, founded and conducted by Christian Curnyn, who has assembled an enviably brilliant cast.

We seem to be living through a golden age of counter-tenors, and the two involved in this recording – Tim Mead and Iestyn Davies – are among the most accomplished. Davies is particularly good, as dramatically anguished in the despairing aria ‘Rompo I lacci’ as he is eloquently beautiful in ‘Amor, nel mio pena’. The dexterity and tone of his voice is truly extraordinary. Hilary Summers should perhaps sound a little less matronly and more sex-kittenish as Teodara, who all the fuss is after all about, but Renata Pokupić, Rosemary Joshua and Andrew Foster-Williams are particularly notable among a strong cast. The orchestra is extremely accomplished, and it is only occasionally that (as in ‘Ma chi punir desio?’) one longs fairly desperately for the richer tone and sonority of modern strings. Any lover of Handel opera will want this generous two-disk set (nearly 150 minutes of music) of a piece the neglect of which becomes more surprising the more you listen to it. – Derek Parker