Jakob Lehmann conducts Rossini’s Ermione & Stabat Mater with Orchestra Révolutionnaire et Romantique

The overture, which incorporates the off-stage male refrain (right here on-stage) was a mixture of robust drama and vivid element. All through the opera, Lehmann’s method to the music introduced out the energy of Rossini’s musical framework and for all the flowery vocal element, there was one thing neo-Classical, virtually sculptural in regards to the music. The opening refrain correct was robust and critical, with centered depth from the choir and a mixture of laborious edges and nice element within the orchestra.

Hannah Ludwig was impressively fierce as Andromaca, projecting her opening scene with compelling focus. Her cavatina featured an expressive use of register modifications, with deal with a robust decrease register but with nice filigree higher notes. This was decoration as an expressive device fairly than simply for present. Her caballeta displayed actual fireplace, with Ludwig projecting the character’s fierceness and management. The smaller roles of Cefisa, Attalo and Fenicio (Anghard Rowlands, Marcus Swietlicki, Anthony Robin Schneider) offered nice help.

We then jumped to the second scene of the opera for one thing lighter, a pleasant celebratory refrain and aria with Elinor Rolfe Johnson on delightfully bouncy kind as Cleone. However the actual spotlight of this scene was the opening with its fabulously raspy horns (all 4 of them).

Rossini: Ermione – Alasdair Kent (Oreste), Xavier Hetherington (Pilade) – Jakob Lehmann, Orchestra Révolutionnaire et Romantique at Cadogan Corridor (Photograph: Paul Marc Mitchell)

The scene for Oreste (Alasdair Kent) and Pilade (Xavier Hetherington) is typical Rossini in the best way he extends what’s a standard double aria for Oreste into one thing extra, each by stretching the music but in addition by together with Pilade as an energetic participant within the drama. Oreste is right here conflicted, he loves Ermione (who doesn’t love him) and is meant to make sure she marries another person. We started with robust drama in accompanied recitative the place the 2 males’s elaborate traces projected robust emotion. Kent’s account of Oreste’s cavatina was fearless. The position goes alarmingly excessive (it was written for Giovanni David who created a number of such position for Rossini) but Kent weaved this into the entire, approaching the peaks in the proper spirit. After which his cabaletta featured some insanely quick passagework. Hetherington’s Pilade received to point out off too, however solely ever in a supporting position but Hetherington gave nearly as good as he received within the dramatic interchanges.

However the focus of the excerpts was scenes two and three from Act Two, the place Ermione (Beth Taylor) struggles with the truth that Pirro doesn’t love her and is marrying Andromaca. Ermione persuades Oreste to kill Pirro, saying she is going to then marry him, however is wracked with regret. The 2 scenes have Ermione on stage in any respect time and push the character by a sequence of utmost feelings. Rossini’s music doesn’t intention for crowd-pleasing present, that is final drama 1819 type. Lehmann supported the entire with robust orchestra gestures and nice element.

The scenes started with a terrific face off between Beth Taylor’s Ermione and Hannah Ludwig’s Andromaca, although alas Andromaca leaves the stage early. Like Ludwig earlier, Taylor made nice use of her decrease registers, utilizing change in register as a method of colouring the vocal line and switching emotion up a gear. But there was delicacy too. When she sang of her love for Pirro, the aria was elaborate but transferring. Maybe extra hanging was the second when she reacted to listening to the off-stage marriage ceremony march for Andromaca and Pirro, with Taylor projecting stylised dramatic statements over the robust orchestral contribution.

Rossini: Ermione – Elinor Rolfe Johnson (Cleone) – Jakob Lehmann, Orchestra Révolutionnaire et Romantique at Cadogan Corridor (Photograph: Paul Marc Mitchell)

When Alasdair Kent’s Oreste and the refrain appeared, Rossini launched the crescendo passage from the overture, however there was no bouncy enjoyable right here. This was robust feelings, compelling drama and vocal spectacle. The scene ended with Taylor’s vivid outpouring of emotion in a quick, bravura aria as Ermione has simply despatched Oreste off to kill Pirro. This introduced Rossini’s Gran Scena Ermione to a conclusion although frustratingly we didn’t get to listen to the opera’s closing scenes.

This hour of music from the opera was a beautiful taster for the complete factor, and I used to be impressed by the best way the singers have been in a position to conjure the characters and robust feelings from a number of scenes. Orchestrally, the combination for energy and delicacy was notably noticeable. There have been plenty of particular person instrumental highlights and in lots of locations the complexity of Rossini’s orchestral writing was matched by a nice array of timbres and textures.

Rossini started his Stabat Mater in 1831, two years after his closing opera William Inform. The primary model of the Stabat Mater featured half Rossini and half a buddy, Giovanni Tadolini. When a writer needed to print it, Rossini rapidly wrote the remaining components in order that the model carried out in 1842 is all him. This was over 20 years earlier than the Petite Messe Solennelle however that work’s fascination for large-scale counterpoint continues to be current together with a fairly sly nod to operatic textures.

For this efficiency the soloists have been Ana Maria Labin, Hannah Ludwig, Alasdair Kent and Anthony Robin Schneider. The Introduzione started deep and darkish with Rossini’ extending the motion into one thing complicated involving each refrain and soloists. This was Rossini at his most critical and educational. But the next tenor aria is infamous for its bouncy jollity. Alasdair Kent managed to imbue the aria with actual emotion and Lehmann’s orchestra gestures have been robust, however that perky bounce was nonetheless opera buffa Rossini. After some fabulous enjoying from hand-stopped horns, the duet from Ana Maria Labin and Hannah Ludwig gave us two contrasting operatic voices stuffed with wealthy character, with some beautifully elaborate duet moments. Having performed a supporting position within the first half, Anthony Robin Schneider got here into his personal with voice displaying each heat and amplitude, together with a terrific sense of line in his solo, adopted by the hanging unaccompanied refrain with bass recitative.

Rossini: Stabat Mater – Ana Maria Labin, Hannah Ludwig, Alasdair Kent, Anthony Robin Schneider – Jakob Lehmann, Monteverdi Choir, Orchestra Révolutionnaire et Romantique at Cadogan Corridor (Photograph:

The ‘Sancta Mater’ quartet was quick and perky, we have been undoubtedly again in opera land and Lehmann actually constructed the joy. This result in a robust solo from Ludwig in her cavatina, once more exploiting nice chest colors. Equally, Labin was on robust kind in her cavatina, bringing in hanging contrasts of tone. Maybe probably the most daring motion, nevertheless, is the penultimate one the place Rossini write an prolonged unaccompanied ensemble for the 4 soloists. Right here they have been terrific, and there have been no tuning points as Lehmann launched that incredible closing refrain.