Philippe Jaroussky - Carestini (The Story of a Castrato)

Philippe Jaroussky - Carestini (The Story of a Castrato)

Philippe Jaroussky - Carestini (The Story of a Castrato)
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Composer: George Frideric Handel
Composer: Nicolo Porpora
Composer: Johann Adolf Hasse
Composer: Christoph Willibald Gluck
Composer: Leonardo Leo
Composer: Carl Heinrich Graun
Composer: Giovanni Battista Alveri
Conductor: Emmanuelle Haim
Orchestra: Le Concert d'Astree
Performer: Philippe Jaroussky
Edition: Music CD
CD Release Date: 2007-11-20
Music Label: Virgin Classics
Soundtracks:
  1. Porpora: Siface: Aria - Tu che d'ardir m'accendi
  2. Capelli: I fratelli riconosciuti: Aria - Ciel nemico, avverse stelle
  3. Handel: Arianna in Creta: Aria - Qui ti sfido, o mostro infame!
  4. Handel: Ariodante: Recitativo - E vivo ancora? - Aria - Scherza, infida
  5. Handel: Alcina: Aria - Sta nell'Ircana
  6. Handel: Alcina: Recitativo - Chi scopre al mio pensiero - Aria - Mi lusinga il dolce affetto
  7. Leo: Farnace: Aria - Se mi dai morte
  8. Hasse: La clemenza di Tito: Aria - Se mai senti
  9. Hasse: La clemenza di Tito: Aria - Vo disperato a morte
  10. Gluck: Demofoonte: Aria - Sperai vicino il lido
  11. Graun: Orfeo: Recitativo - Ecco all'aure superne - Aria - Mio bel nume, ah! dove sei?
  12. Graun: Orfeo: Aria - In mirar la mia sventura

Music reviews of Philippe Jaroussky - Carestini (The Story of a Castrato)

Music Review: The Music Makes the Singer...
Rating: 5 Stars

... but the singer makes the music work! Composers of the 18th Century wrote many of their best opera roles for specific singers whom they knew could make those roles work. Thus we know the identities of singers long dead and obviously never recorded - Senesino, Farinelli, Carestini - and by studying the music written for them, we can get a good idea of how they sang. That's the core method of "historically informed" performance practice, the method that is fundamental to the development of countertenor technique in modern times. Development doesn't occur spontaneously; it's taken decades to achieve the artistry of countertenors today. All great singers are specially endowed by nature, but all great singers reach performance level by studied development. Philippe Jaroussky is not an exception; he's the rule.

Listening to this CD of selections from operas by Handel and Gluck... and Porpora and Hasse.....!! and Gruan, Capelli, and Leo...??? one might easily suppose that every Baroque opera by any forgotten composer must have contained at least one superb aria. I'm willing to grant that supposition, but it was Carestini who sang these arias originally, with his "exquisite taste," and it's Philippe Jaroussky today who makes them so musically convincing with his exquisite technique.

Jaroussky sings in operatic soprano range, but his voice is not a woman's voice. It has timbre that are as masculine as a Russian basso's. There are other "sopranists" performing, but none of them sound as unforced and nuanced as Jaroussky. Let's make it simple: he's the best.

Emmanuelle Haim and Le Concert d'Astree has been establishing a niche for powerful, full-throated performances of early music. Some of their efforts are way overblown, but this time they are note perfect. The historical castrati like Carestini were not wimpy singers; they were acclaimed for their thrilling power of delivery. These selected arias include some powerful orchestral frames - trumpets and horns, resonant reeds, vigorous fiddles - and Jaroussky fills each frame with his vocal intensity. This is a recording that stands to define the art of the male soprano in our times.

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