This version of Israel in Egypt dates back to 1990: it is a live recording, made at the Gottingen Festival and the Queen Elizabeth Hall – and consigned to disc with such care that there is no disturbance from audience noise. Its great merit lies in the choral singing, which shows John Eliot Gardiner's Monteverdi Choir at their magnificent best. Play the opening track of the second disc, and you will certainly want to buy the set, after hearing the superb precision of the choir in these semiquaver runs and the sprightly, well-sprung rhythms. All the lively choruses are of this quality: listen to the ones depicting the plagues of flies and of hailstones, in Part 1, or ''Thy right hand, O Lord'' in Part 2 – another piece of virtuoso choralism. It is not only the rapid and athletic choruses that fare well: the lyrical singing in the pastoral music of ''But as for his people'' is just as impressive. Gardiner often shapes the music more, or more self-consciously, than Handel might have done, and perhaps more than he generally does nowadays; but there is always musical reason and the effect is often very compelling.
Israel in Egypt is of course the choral oratorio par excellence – too much so for Handel's own audiences, for whom it had to be given, at its second hearing, ''shortn'd and intermix'd with songs''. With so few solos, conductors often don't engage starry soloists but give the members of their choir a chance to shine. That is what is done here, and I have to say that in a recording it doesn't work very well. When, for the very last solo item, Michael Chance comes in, we are made all too obviously aware of what we have been missing: a soloist capable of projecting the music with force and character. All, or nearly all, the solo singers here are adequate, technically; they get round the notes, and they sing in tune (Miriam's Song comes close to being an exception, I fear). Some do more than that: I enjoyed hearing ''The Lord is a man of war'' done without ranting. But several items are simply undistinguished, and dull: the soprano duet early on in Part 2, the alto-tenor duet near the end, and the wonderful soprano ''Thou didst blow'', one of Handel's most inspired pieces of writing, but here sung in rather pedestrian fashion. On a recorded performance one expects better.
So this set is one to consider only if the choral music is the prime attraction. One might add, the orchestral: the English Baroque Soloists excel, especially in the plague choruses, where their playing is specially vivid and precise – and I love the sound of the bass trombone's rasp which Gardiner allows through the texture several times at critical moments. Gardiner has recorded the work before, with the same choir and orchestra and some of the same soloists (Erato, 1/80); my choice has, however, generally been the Parrott performance for EMI and I am afraid the new one doesn't alter that recommendation in spite of the distinction of the choral contribution.
Israel in Egypt is a short oratorio, in two acts (the first of them rather brief) instead of the usual three. Some recordings include the music, an adaptation of the funeral anthem he had recently written for Queen Caroline, that Handel gave at the premiere. Gardiner chooses royal music but of a more jubilant nature, two of the coronation anthems: of which he directs vigorous, spirited and spacious readings, as inspiriting as any I can remember.'