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Handel: Semele

Louise Alder (Semele), Hugo Hymas (Jupiter), Lucile Richardot (Juno/Ino), Carlo Vistoli (Athamas), Gianluca Buratto (Somnus/Cadmus), Emily Owen (Iris), Angela Hicks (Cupid), Peter Davoren (Apollo)

English Baroque Soloists, Monteverdi Choir, Sir John Eliot Gardiner

Alder is riveting in the title role as she mutates from soft seductress to vain brat to crushed victim, applying a range of styles to develop her character...Richardot’s intensity equals Alder’s,... — BBC Music Magazine, Christmas 2020, 5 out of 5 stars (Performance) / 4 out of 5 stars (Recording) More…

Release Date: 2nd Oct 2020
Catalogue No: SDG733
Label: SDG
Length: 2 hours 35 minutes

Gramophone Magazine

September 2020

Editor's Choice
Presto Recording of the Week

2nd October 2020
BBC Music Magazine

Christmas 2020

Opera Choice
The Times Records of the Year

2020

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Handel: Semele

Work length2:35:12

$68.00

$81.60

$119.00

Dan D’Souza (baritone), Carlo Vistoli (counter-tenor), Gianluca Buratto (bass), Louise Alder (soprano), Lucile Richardot (mezzo-soprano), Angharad Rowlands (mezzo-soprano), Emily Owen (soprano), Angela Hicks (soprano), Hugo Hymas (tenor), Peter Davoren (tenor)
English Baroque Soloists, Monteverdi Choir
Sir John Eliot Gardiner

Overture (Live)

Track length4:55

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Gavotte (Live)

Track length1:43

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Behold! Auspicious Flashes Rise (Live)

Track length1:31

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Lucky Omens Bless Our Rites (Live)

Track length3:14

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Daughter, Obey (Live)

Track length1:01

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Ah Me! (Live)

Track length1:00

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O Jove! In Pity Teach Me Which to Choose (Live)

Track length1:57

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Alas! She Yields (Live)

Track length0:44

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Why Dost Thou Thus Untimely Grieve (Live)

Track length2:59

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Avert These Omens, All Ye Pow'rs (Live)

Track length2:01

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Again Auspicious Flashes Rise (Live)

Track length0:59

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Cease, Cease Your Vows, 'Tis Impious to Proceed (Live)

Track length0:33

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Turn, Hopeless Lover, Turn Thy Eyes (Live)

Track length0:44

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Your Tuneful Voice My Tale Would Tell (Live)

Track length4:41

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Too Well I See (Live)

Track length0:47

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You've Undone Me (Live)

Track length2:36

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Ah! Wretched Prince (Live)

Track length0:34

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Hail Cadmus, Hail! (Live)

Track length1:23

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Endless Pleasure, Endless Love (Live)

Track length5:34

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Sinfonia (Live)

Track length1:31

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Iris, Impatient of Thy Stay (Live)

Track length0:46

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There, from Mortal Cares Retiring (Live)

Track length2:54

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Awake, Saturnia, from Thy Lethargy! (Live)

Track length1:48

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Hence, Iris, Hence Away (Live)

Track length3:34

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Come, Zephyrs, Come, While Cupid Sings (Live)

Track length5:40

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O Sleep, Why Dost Thou Leave Me (Live)

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Let Me Not Another Moment (Live)

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Lay Your Doubts and Fears Aside (Live)

Track length3:09

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You Are Mortal and Require (Live)

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With Fond Desiring (Live)

Track length2:55

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How Engaging, How Endearing (Live)

Track length2:49

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Ah, Me! (Live)

Track length1:09

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I Must with Speed Amuse Her (Live)

Track length3:47

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Now Love That Everlasting Boy Invites (Live)

Track length2:18

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By My Command (Live)

Track length1:14

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Where'er You Walk, Cool Gales Shall Fan the Glade (Live)

Track length5:24

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Dear Sister, How Was Your Passage Hither? (Live)

Track length0:53

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But Hark! The Heav'nly Sphere Turns Round (Live)

Track length1:53

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Prepare Then, Ye Immortal Choir (Live)

Track length2:09

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Bless the Glad Earth with Heav'nly Lays (Live)

Track length2:46

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Sinfonia (Live)

Track length1:37

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Somnus, Awake (Live)

Track length0:30

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Leave Me, Loathsome Light (Live)

Track length3:38

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Dull God, Canst Thou Attend the Water's Fall (Live)

Track length0:33

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More Sweet Is That Name (Live)

Track length2:28

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My Will Obey (Live)

Track length1:21

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Obey My Will, Thy Rod Resign (Live)

Track length2:03

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My Racking Thoughts by No Kind Slumbers Freed (Live)

Track length3:11

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Thus Shap'd Like Ino (Live)

Track length1:32

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Myself I Shall Adore (Live)

Track length6:39

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Be Wise As You Are Beautiful (Live)

Track length1:43

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Thus Let My Thanks Be Paid (Live)

Track length2:46

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Rich Odours Fill the Fragrant Air (Live)

Track length0:24

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Come to My Arms, My Lovely Fair (Live)

Track length3:32

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O Semele! (Live)

Track length1:41

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Speak, Speak Your Desire (Live)

Track length1:08

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Ah, Take Heed What You Press (Live)

Track length1:04

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No, No, I'll Take No Less (Live)

Track length4:45

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Ah, Whither Is She Gone, Unhappy Fair? (Live)

Track length3:21

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Above Measure (Live)

Track length2:10

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Ah me! Too Late I Now Repent (Live)

Track length3:26

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O Terror and Astonishment! (Live)

Track length4:16

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How I Was Hence Remov'd (Live)

Track length0:46

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Despair No More Shall Wound Me (Live)

Track length4:59

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See from Above the Bellying Clouds Descend (Live)

Track length0:18

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Sinfonia (Live)

Track length1:43

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Apollo Comes, to Relieve Your Care (Live)

Track length0:53

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Happy, Happy We Shall Be (Live)

Track length3:06

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Recording of the Week, Handel's Semele from John Eliot Gardiner

2nd October 2020

John Eliot Gardiner revisits Handel's tempestuous tale of gods and mortals, with show-stopping performances from Louise Alder, Hugo Hymas and Lucile Richardot.

"In Spring 2019, the Monteverdi Choir and English Baroque Soloists, led by John Eliot Gardiner, presented a critically-acclaimed European tour of Handel’s opera 'Semele', including Alexandra Palace Theatre in London, where this live recording took place. Semele had not been performed by John Eliot Gardiner and the Monteverdi ensembles since they originally recorded it in the 1980s and this recording gives listeners the chance to hear a fuller version of the work. A glamorous team of young soloists joins the Monteverdi ensembles to bring the story of Semele to life, including celebrated English soprano Louise Alder, who takes on the title role, with the young tenor Hugo Hymas portraying the amorous Jupiter. ""Semele’s musical score is a glorious blend of irresistible solo arias - some virtuosic showstoppers, others lyrical, sensual and evocative, ensembles, duets, accompanied recitatives and (unlike his operas) imposing choruses. Still more than when I first performed it and recorded it almost forty years ago, I feel Semele’s time has finally come.""John Eliot Gardiner"

Reviews

Christmas 2020

Alder is riveting in the title role as she mutates from soft seductress to vain brat to crushed victim, applying a range of styles to develop her character...Richardot’s intensity equals Alder’s, but with less subtlety...Countering her bluster is Hugo Hymas’s warm tenderness as Jupiter, and an always-inventive finessing of Handel’s dense score by the band and choir...Despite Gardiner’s caprices, this Semele production is gorgeous, and among the best ever.

May/June 2021

...the performance is, as expected, excellent. Louise Alder’s Semele is suitably light and demented in her famous aria, while Juno’s Lucile Richardot has a rich and forceful tone, something one might expect of the jealous goddess. Hugo Hymas’s Jupiter can sound a tad thin at times, but he is accurate in terms of phrasing and pitch. And, of course, the rest of the cast follows suit. In short, this is a wonderful recording.

September 2020

A new recording is always welcome, especially when it comes from someone who knows his dramatical business as John Eliot Gardiner does...Alder is a happy choice, her voice rich, fluid and precise, and her agile and alert acting skills finding ideal projection in the wonderful clutch of arias Handel sets before her..Hymas has just the smooth vocal beauty needed for a sympathetic Jupiter.

December 2020

As would be expected, Gardiner’s approach differs considerably from that of the recording made nearly 40 years earlier. Indeed, it not only differs but might be said in many ways to be diametrically opposed to it…he now very evidently conceives the score in as operatically dramatic a fashion as possible...Alder’s bright Semele is most satisfying in lyrical arias..Hymas is a pleasing light lyric tenor with a tone not unlike that of Anthony Rolfe Johnson.

2nd October 2020

Alder’s titular ambitious mortal socialite surely takes the laurels...Her doomed divine sugar-daddy, sung by Hugo Hymas, is cut from similar cloth; his glib assurances to Semele are airily self-confident, thanks in no small part to Hymas’s light, young-sounding tone...Richardot is clearly having enormous amounts of fun chewing the scenery as a goddess driven to the brink of insanity by her desire for revenge.

2nd August 2020

Gardiner’s trump cards are his famous choir — thrilling in the great choral reaction to Semele’s death, O Terror and Astonishment! — and Louise Alder’s entrancing Semele, who makes every highlight...Hugo Hymas’s young Jupiter is an appealing, stylish Handelian. Gardiner is in his element with this great piece.

8th August 2020

In the British soprano Louise Alder we have a new and brilliant young Semele...Fine contributions, too, from Lucile Richardot’s Juno/Ino and Gianluca Buratto’s Cadmus. The loyal and committed Monteverdi Choir and English Baroque Soloists (leader Kati Debretzeni) shine as ever.

3rd July 2020

[Alder] is one of the show’s two big stars, thrillingly responsive to word and mood, whether woozy from sleep and sensuality, lost in self-love, or fading away at the end after a collision with Jupiter’s lightning. And the other star? Handel, of course. Packed with variety, witty, dramatic, Semele is so much fun.

Handel: Semele

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Recording of the Week, Handel's Semele from John Eliot Gardiner