Were it not for its static action and its uncomfortable length we should surely see and hear Bizet's penultimate opera very often, for it contains some of the best of that sensuous, harmonically subtle, orchestrally delicate music for which he has become famed. There are harbingers here of the most inspired pages of Carmen, but also much pseudo-orientalism that wasn't repeated in that masterpiece. Indeed, Winton Dean has commented that it is both musically Bizet's ''first really mature work'' and that it contains ''some of his most striking music'', verdicts with which I would entirely concur. From the opening offstage chorus to the final duet, which has something of both the Jose/Micaela and Jose/Carmen duets in it, the score evokes just the right atmosphere.
The bored Haroun, constantly seeking to renew his amorous appetite with a new slave-girl, is aptly portrayed in his couplets. Djamileh, the girl who really loves him and eventually wins him through a ruse, is charmingly depicted in her first music, a dream song. Her ghazel, where she tells Haroun the tale of a girl whose love is unrequited (its main refrain returns at the end of the piece), has an irregular melody exquisitely harmonized creating a very special mood. Her Tristan-esque Lament is even more remarkable. Splendiano, who thinks he'll get Djamileh as one of his master's castoffs is also nicely characterized in his couplets. The choruses evoke the Middle-Eastern milieu.
I was delighted with this performance. Popp sings Djamileh's entrancing music in impeccable French and with just the right plangency of tone, the voice floating easily in melismatic passages. Bonisolli seems transformed, as is often the case when he tackles French music, from the beefy tenor known at Covent Garden. Here he sings with attractive tone, refined line and restrained passion. He is about as attuned to the part of Haroun as you could wish. Lafont makes a lively Splendiano. Gardelli unerringly delineates the perfumed charm of the score, and receives warm singing and playing from the Bavarian Radio forces. The recording, made in 1983, is unassumingly right, perhaps just a little too recessed for my liking. The inclusion of text and translation completes my pleasure in this issue.'