Among the works of the Red Priest that were absolutely unknown until the end of the 20th century, and which the naïve label has revealed with great perseverance for almost twenty-five years, are the works intended for the stage. This box set is dedicated to Arsilda, the twentieth of the twenty-one operas by the Venetian preserved at the National Library of Turin.

Andrea Marcon, a great specialist in the work of the Red Priest - as revealed by extraordinary recordings with the violinist Giuliano Carmignola in the 2000s - immerses his musicians of La Cetra Basel and his seven singers in an ocean of expressions. In Marcon’s lively and fluid gesture, the composer’s theatrical gift bursts forth once again and is surrounded by a strangely discreet poetry. Perhaps an echo of the heady mystery of Venice.

Created in October 1716 at the Teatro Sant’Angelo in Venice, the opera features Arsilda, the queen of an ancient region of northern Anatolia, promised to Tamese, prince, who had just become king of Cilicia, a neighbouring region. Barzane, king of Lydia, another neighbouring region, has fallen in love with Arsilda, but is secretly engaged to Tamese’s twin sister Lisea. Slightly chaotic, the story takes place at the beginning of our era in Ama (modern days Tarsus). With its seven different roles, harmoniously balanced despite the predominance of Lisea, this musical drama is similar to a masquerade, full of disguises and games on identities - Lisea plays the role of her brother Tamese for two whole acts.

Highly versatile in its dramatic situations, one finds in Arsilda a prison scene, a royal hunt, a sexual assault, fights and multiple pseudo- religious public ceremonies: so many situations that stimulate Vivaldi’s insatiable imagination. If the composer, for this opera, takes up an aria from his oratorio Juditha triumphans, composed very shortly before, the rest of the work is composed of totally new music.

Among the most beautiful moments, let us mention Barzane’s aria (Quelusignolo, Act II, scene 9) where Vivaldi surrounds the voice of a nightingale (violins) and a cuckoo (viola) by reproducing the little steps of the birds with repeated eighth notes, chromatically ascending. Let us not forget also the entirety of scene 6 in the second Act, a moment of tremendous inventiveness, an astonishing succession of almost cinematic snapshots, whose fine writing sometimes announces certain passages from Mozart’s Nozze di Figaro.