Purcell: Dido and Aeneas
$35.00
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HENRY PURCELL
Purcell: Dido and Aeneas
Rachael Lloyd, Elin Manahan Thomas, Robert Davies, Roderick Morris, Eloise Irving /. Armonico Consort, Christopher Monksristopher Monks
[ Signum / CD ]
Release Date: Saturday 25 July 2015
This item is currently out of stock. It may take 6 or more weeks to obtain from when you place your order as this is a specialist product.
Purcell's ever-green chamber opera Dido & Aeneas, its story drawn from Virgil's epic, the Aeneid, is performed by the Armonico Consort with an enchanting selection of soloists, including Rachael Lloyd, Robert Davies & Elin Manahan Thomas.
Armonico Consort is one of the largest and most innovative organisations of its kind in the UK, existing to inspire audiences with its unique programmes.
"The Armonico Consort and its musical director, Christopher Monks, capture this abundance of inspiration in a performance full of life and variety...Rachael Lloyd's dignified Dido and Elin Manahan Thomas's bright Belinda are well contrasted." (Financial Times)
"This account has likeable soloists..., a fine chorus (though "Great minds" and "With drooping wings" are too slow) and a lively band. One-string-to-a-part weakens passages like the end of "Oft she visits", but brings out Purcell's expressive part-writing." (Sunday Times)
"a fine performance should magic up a sense of epic. Christopher Monks and his Armonico Consort almost manage to. This is a clean, uncluttered account featuring crystalline voices, good diction, safe tempos and well-defined phrasing...vocal ensembles are luminous and the instrumental playing is bright and streamlined. Best of all is Rachael Lloyd's dignified Dido, rich-voiced, poetic and flawlessly delivered." (The Guardian)
"lithe, colourful, tastefully phrased and dynamically astute playing...[the cast] sing compellingly and inhabit their roles with the same sensitivity that distinguishes the whole performance." (Daily Telegraph)
"There's a lot going for this newcomer. The scale is modest...The playing is wonderfully vital...The soloists are equally fine. Bright-toned Elin Manahan Thomas is well cast as Belinda...Roderick Morris is pleasingly unexaggerated as a countertenor Sorceress...Rachael Lloyd - lovesick, imperious, resigned - is an excellent Dido, her famous Lament no less effective for being restrained." Gramophone Magazine, August 2015
"This new recording, with a cast of youthful, fresh-voiced soloists and an ingenuous approach, recaptures the spirit of the first known performance in a Chelsea boarding school for 'young gentlewomen'…Rachel Lloyd makes a graceful Dido…Christopher Monks's fleet direction and wispy instrumental playing enhance the all-pervasive dance rhythms." BBC Music Magazine, September 2015
