Henry Desmarets had several tragédies en musique to his name before embarking on Iphigénie en Tauride, to a text by his regular collaborator Joseph-François Duché de Vancy. It opened at the Paris Opéra on May 6, 1704, but Desmarets had left it unfinished: not because he had died (he lived on till 1741), but because he had fled the country under sentence of death for seducing one of his pupils. (He married her, and was eventually pardoned.) The opera was completed by André Campra, the words provided by his own regular librettist, Antoine Danchet. Campra contributed the Overture and Prologue, and various numbers including the recognition scene for Iphigenia and her brother Orestes. A success from the outset, it was revived several times at the Opéra, right up to 1762.

The story, from Euripides, is familiar from Gluck’s setting of 1779. Iphigenia, saved by Diana from being sacrificed at Aulis, was spirited away to Tauris in Scythia, where she is now serving as a priestess of the goddess. Orestes, accompanied by his friend Pylades, arrives on a mission to return the statue of Diana to Greece, the barbarian Scythians having profaned her temple. Unfortunately for the Greeks, the local custom is for visitors to be executed; Iphigenia vows to help them escape, being strangely drawn to Orestes, though neither recognises the other. In a surprising twist to the tale, Orestes’ other sister, Electra, has tagged along too, she and Pylades being in love; while Thoas, the barbarian king, faces the problem of being in love with her himself. You might think that he would ask Electra her name; but none of the three foreigners is identified. In the end, thanks to the intervention of Diana, Thoas is killed, the Greeks head for home, and the temple is destroyed.

The Prologue is set on Delos, where the people are celebrating games in honour of Apollo and Diana. The real object of their praise is clearly Louis XIV: this was standard practice in the tragédies of Lully and, as Benoît Dratwicki observes in his booklet note, ‘the shadow of Lully … hangs over the score’, with its recitatives and airs and, in the divertissements, choruses and dances; though actually it’s Diana, not Apollo, who descends, explaining that she is on her way to rescue Orestes.

If the opera has a flaw, it’s in the matter of balance. Iphigenia doesn’t appear at all in Acts 2 and 3. However, she does establish her presence at the start of Act 1, where she recounts a vision of the bloodied figure of her mother Clytemnestra (‘Dans l’horreur d’une nuit terrible’). The music is by Campra, but the situation is so similar to a scene in Racine’s Athalie (‘C’était pendant l’horreur d’une profonde nuit’) that I wonder if Campra isn’t setting words by Duché de Vancy (rather than his own librettist), who like his predecessor Racine wrote edifying dramas for the young ladies at Mme de Maintenon’s school at Saint-Cyr. Campra also composed Iphigenia’s later soliloquy ‘Seuls confidents de mes peines secretes!’, a gentle da capo number with an unobtrusively contrapuntal accompaniment.

Orestes too has a hallucination about Clytemnestra, to the alarm of his companions. Here the music is by Desmarets, a pounding bass line underpinning the voice. A descending chromatic phrase illustrates his unhinged mind as he vows to follow the Furies down to Hades, after which he swoons. He is revived by the descent of Diana, who launches the Act 2 divertissement to the ethereal sounds of flutes and violins without continuo. It makes an enchanting contrast; Campra adopted the same scoring when he came to compose the Prologue.

As I noted above, the part of Iphigenia is initially under-written, even the recollection of her own hallucination lasting less than a minute. Once Act 4 is under way, though, she takes over. In ‘C’est trop vous faire violence’, a chaconne in all but name, she determines not to perform the required sacrifice on the strangers. The music is restrained but Véronique Gens imbues it with a passion that develops in the scenes with Orestes, eliciting a comparable response from Thomas Dolié. These are splendid performances. David Witczak makes a fierce Thoas, the barbarian king, while Olivia Doray and Reinoud Van Mechelen are exemplary as Electra and Pylades.

Apart from the offstage ‘Choeur de Combattants’ being very much present, the recording is clear and well balanced. As well as strings, the orchestra comprises flutes, recorders, oboes and bassoons, and a percussion section that includes castanets. Hervé Niquet conducts his singers and players with his customary stylishness. All praise to Niquet, Alpha and their various sponsors for reviving this unknown oddity.