Philippe Jaroussky - J.C. Bach: La Dolce Fiamma- Forgotten castrato arias
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Artist: Philippe JarousskyConductor: Jeremie Rhorer
Orchestra: Le Cercle De L'Harmonie
Edition: Music CD
Audio: English (Unknown)
CD Release Date: 2010-01-12
Music Label: Virgin Classics
Soundtracks:
- Pugna il guerriero Artaserse
- Perché tarda è mai la morte Concert Aria
- Sentimi, non partir...Al mio bene Orfeo ed Euridice
- Sentimi, non partir...Al mio bene Orfeo ed Euridice(cont.)
- La legge accetto Adriano in Siria
- Cara, la dolce fiamma
- Tutti nemici, e rei Carattaco
- Perfida Cartismandua!...Fra l'orrore Artaserse
- Perfida Cartismandua!...Fra l'orrore Artaserse (cont.)
- No, che non ha la sorte...Vo solcando un mar crudele Concert aria
- No, che non ha la sorte...Vo solcando un mar crudele Concert aria (cont.)
- Ebben si vada... Io ti lascio Temistocle
- Ebben si vada... Io ti lascio Temistocle (cont.)
- Ch'io parta?
Music reviews of J.C. Bach: La Dolce Fiamma- Forgotten castrato arias
Music Review: More beautiful than Johann Christian Bach you die
Rating: 5 Stars
The first surprise is the music itself and this rather not very well known composer, one of Johann Sebastian Bach's sons. Surprising because it is nothing but opera arias and not religious music at all. This son followed a road that his father hardly followed and his brothers not very much. The reason must be complex and must have to do with the change in that century that is taking Germany away from feudalism and its strict religious ideology to some more modern society that considers music more as an entertainment than as a spiritual enlightening religious elevation. The father had done some vocal composition on non-religious subjects but it was within the religious fundamentalism of his time: a cantata against coffee or against tobacco. Maybe there are some more that are not yet known and are buried in some library or archives somewhere in Leipzig or in the vast world. It is good to show this one of the Bach children dedicated his art to secular operas and it opened a door to a particular voice that was not very present, if ever in its male version, in the father's music, the castrato, the alto, that voice of angels that Bach did not use for his angels, when he had angels on his stage, sorry in his choir. The second surprise comes from the musical style. Brilliant in its finesse, brightness and expert virtuoso complexity but not in the austere line of the father's music or in the line of some religious compositions of his brothers and the very didactic Passions of that second Bach generation. It is as complex as a lot of Mozart's operatic music in the use of instruments, in the use of a modern syntax and harmony. But we could also think of Handel and the numerous operas of his we are also rediscovering today. How can we turn some numerous lines of notes that some will say to be too numerous into dramatic elements? How can we give depth to what is nothing but superficial luminous shine? That is where Johann Christian Bach uses the melody of these strings of notes, and even plays on a minor variation on one or two notes in a major sentence creating a pang of pleasure in our ears, a pang of conscience too that corresponds to the dramatic content of the opera. The use of an alto, and obviously a castrato in his time, by Johann Christian Bach gets him into a vocal field that is necessarily tragic, dramatic, deep and can become bleak, sad, poignant even when used properly. We reach here the dilemma of Goethe's Faust at the end of his second part when God himself is confronted with that dilemma. The alto is the voice of heroes that Handel will use so much for his biblical or secular heroes, and the composer here does not reduce these heroes to their conquering power but tries to evoke, bring out their deeper and more human side: suffering souls confronted to a world they have to change in order to make it better and that mission is beyond any human imagination because it requires the possibility to see human history in its vast perspective. A hero becomes poignant when he knows that the victory he is bringing to the world is also the defeat of some older order that has to disappear for his victory to be in any way effective. If Hannibal had not considered that three victories meant the complete defeat of Rome as it was stated in the rules of war at the time, he would have taken Rome and destroyed the city and then he would have been victorious instead of being in the long run defeated. In every single aria of this selection we feel that dual and contradictory dimension between pleasure and suffering, an enlightened vision of the future that is coming and a just as much enlightened vision of the past that has to go. The sixth track of this CD, "Cara, la dolce flamma", is just the demonstration in 13 minutes of that beautiful ambiguous torn apart suffering pleasure or pleasurable suffering. Just perfect. But it is not the only piece that has that beauty, far from it. But we are also surprised, oh no, kidnapped and tortured into the most exquisite pleasure by the voice of Philippe Jaroussky. That boy has a secret and no one will ever try to find it out, because that's a loss of time. Let's enjoy the result and enjoy it again and again. Don't in any way think this male voice is not male, even in some little corners of this CD. Jaroussky has a man's voice but he is able to play on the perfect clarity of his register and with enough width from a mezza di voce to the highest and clearest high pitched or should I say high perched notes. Jaroussky is able to express any kind of feeling and sentiment and particularly those that require a play on the ambiguity of the soul divided and tyrannized by the call of blood, of evil in a world that can only survive and bloom if the call of love and good is the winner of this heart tearing battle. Jaroussky is not the voice of God, and if he is the voice of some angels he knows that some of these angels have been dropped down from Heaven onto Earth and have become dark sombre devils. He knows a seraph is nothing but a variation of the bronze serpent of Moses, a saraph. Jaroussky is a permanent battle between seraphim and saraphim and that makes us feel so strong in our resolve to love pleasure, the pleasure we get from these arias emerging from beyond the oblivion of three centuries.
Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne, University Paris 8 Vincennes Saint Denis, University Paris 12 Créteil, CEGID Boulogne Billancourt
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Description of J.C. Bach: La Dolce Fiamma- Forgotten castrato arias
Philippe Jaroussky's last operatic recital for Virgin Classics collected arias written for a castrato singer, Carestini, whose star had been somewhat eclipsed by his contemporaries Farinelli and Senesino. In this newest release, the French countertenor, with his voice of "startling beauty" (Classic FM ) turns to a composer who -- despite his famous surname, his celebrity in his lifetime, and his influence on the young Mozart -- is still not given his full due: Johann Christian Bach (1735-1782). The repertoire is comprised of arias from six of his operas, written for Milan, Mannheim and London, the city in which he spent the last 20 years of his life and where, in 1764, he met the Mozart, then a touring child prodigy.Jaroussky is an international star, and the ethereal, sensuous beauty of his voice lends itself perfectly to the voluptuous, decadent music in these songs -- including a number of rarities by composers such as Dukas, Caplet, and Chaminade, as well as better-known numbers by figures like Fauré, Chausson and Hahn. Jaroussky's partners on this disc are Le Cercle de L'Harmonie and Jérémie Rhorer, who played an important role in soprano Diana Damrau's Virgin Classics recitals Arie di bravura and Mozart: Donna.Classical CDs
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