HANDEL Finest Arias for Bass Voice (Christopher Purves)
View record and artist detailsRecord and Artist Details
Composer or Director: George Frideric Handel
Genre:
Opera
Label: Hyperion
Magazine Review Date: 08/2018
Media Format: CD or Download
Media Runtime: 77
Mastering:
DDD
Catalogue Number: CDA68152
Tracks:
Composition | Artist Credit |
---|---|
Siroe, Re di Persia, Movement: ~ |
George Frideric Handel, Composer
Arcangelo Christopher Purves, Baritone George Frideric Handel, Composer Jonathan Cohen, Conductor |
Esther, Movement: ~ |
George Frideric Handel, Composer
Arcangelo Christopher Purves, Baritone George Frideric Handel, Composer Jonathan Cohen, Conductor |
Athalia, Movement: When storms the proud |
George Frideric Handel, Composer
Arcangelo Christopher Purves, Baritone George Frideric Handel, Composer Jonathan Cohen, Conductor |
Belshazzar, Movement: ~ |
George Frideric Handel, Composer
Arcangelo Christopher Purves, Baritone George Frideric Handel, Composer Jonathan Cohen, Conductor |
Catone, Movement: È ver che all'amo intorno |
George Frideric Handel, Composer
Arcangelo Christopher Purves, Baritone George Frideric Handel, Composer Jonathan Cohen, Conductor |
(6) Concerti grossi |
George Frideric Handel, Composer
Arcangelo Christopher Purves, Baritone George Frideric Handel, Composer Jonathan Cohen, Conductor |
Tolomeo, Re di Egitto, Movement: Piangi pur |
George Frideric Handel, Composer
Arcangelo Christopher Purves, Baritone George Frideric Handel, Composer Jonathan Cohen, Conductor |
Athalia, Movement: ~ |
George Frideric Handel, Composer
Arcangelo Christopher Purves, Baritone George Frideric Handel, Composer Jonathan Cohen, Conductor |
Nell' africane selve |
George Frideric Handel, Composer
Arcangelo Christopher Purves, Baritone George Frideric Handel, Composer Jonathan Cohen, Conductor |
Joshua, Movement: The walls are levell'd, pour the chosen bands |
George Frideric Handel, Composer
Arcangelo Christopher Purves, Baritone George Frideric Handel, Composer Jonathan Cohen, Conductor |
Joshua, Movement: See, the raging flames arise |
George Frideric Handel, Composer
Arcangelo Christopher Purves, Baritone George Frideric Handel, Composer Jonathan Cohen, Conductor |
Siroe, Re di Persia, Movement: Tu di pietà mi spogli |
George Frideric Handel, Composer
Arcangelo Christopher Purves, Baritone George Frideric Handel, Composer Jonathan Cohen, Conductor |
Rinaldo, Movement: ~ |
George Frideric Handel, Composer
Arcangelo Christopher Purves, Baritone George Frideric Handel, Composer Jonathan Cohen, Conductor |
Joshua, Movement: Shall I in Mamre's fertile plain |
George Frideric Handel, Composer
Arcangelo Christopher Purves, Baritone George Frideric Handel, Composer Jonathan Cohen, Conductor |
Author: Richard Wigmore
Purves is surely unique among today’s Anglophone singers in fusing an easily produced high baritone, by turns mellifluous and incisive, with a clean, resonant bass register. Like Montagnana, he is specially adept at negotiating what an 18th-century commentator termed ‘distant intervals’. The very look of Nell’africane selve suggests grotesquerie, with shades of the cyclops in Handel’s Neapolitan serenata Aci, Galatea e Polifemo (cantata and serenata were probably written for the same singer). Moving smoothly between registers, Purves manages the improbable plunges and two and a half-octave range with lyrical grace, culminating in the amorous entreaty of the final aria. Here and elsewhere, characterisation is always apt and specific, yet never at the expense of beauty of tone and firmness of line. He brings an agonised intensity to Cosroe’s ‘Gelido in ogni veno’ (belatedly conscience-stricken after ordering his son’s murder) and sings Haman’s entreaty to Esther ‘Turn not, O queen’ with a blanched, traumatised tone, gently cushioned by the Arcangelo strings.
Amid so much introspection and soul-searching, straightforward Handelian vigour is represented by sturdy arias from Athalia and Joshua, and strutting ‘rage’ arias from Tolomeo and Siroe – a speciality of the high bass Giuseppe Maria Boschi. Purves provides athleticism and Boschi-like venom aplenty but never merely blusters. Yet it is the slower numbers that tend to linger in the imagination, not least Purves’s hushed tenderness in Gobrias’s lament for his son and Caleb’s sublime vision of a tranquil old age, matched by warmly rounded strings.
Ever alive to texture and subtleties of colour, Arcangelo on their own give a fresh, spirited account of one of the Op 3 Concerti grossi, with delightfully perky oboe contributions and witty variations of scoring in the final minuet. David Vickers’s informative essay, placing each item crisply in context, sets the seal on a Handelian winner.
Discover the world's largest classical music catalogue with Presto Music.
Gramophone Digital Club
- Digital Edition
- Digital Archive
- Reviews Database
- Full website access
From £8.75 / month
SubscribeGramophone Full Club
- Print Edition
- Digital Edition
- Digital Archive
- Reviews Database
- Full website access
From £11.00 / month
Subscribe
If you are a library, university or other organisation that would be interested in an institutional subscription to Gramophone please click here for further information.