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MONTEVERDI © Lebrecht Music & Arts Photo Library ???????????? Claudio Monteverdi (1567 – 1643) The Coronation of Poppea Dramma musicale in a Prologue and two acts Libretto by Giovanni Francesco Busenello, English translation by Geoffrey Dunn Prologue Fortune Barbara Walker soprano Virtue Shirley Chapman soprano Love Elizabeth Gale soprano Opera Ottone, most noble lord Tom McDonnell baritone Poppea, most noble lady, mistress of Nero, Janet Baker mezzo-soprano raised by him to the seat of empire Nero, Roman emperor Robert Ferguson tenor Ottavia, reigning empress, repudiated by Nero Katherine Pring mezzo-soprano Drusilla, lady of the court, in love with Ottone Barbara Walker soprano Seneca, philosopher, preceptor to Nero Clifford Grant bass Arnalta, aged nurse and confidante of Poppea Anne Collins mezzo-soprano Lucano, poet, intimate of Nero, nephew of Seneca Emile Belcourt tenor Valletto, page of the empress John Brecknock tenor Damigella, lady-in-waiting to the empress Iris Saunders soprano Liberto, Captain of the praetorian guard Norman Welsby baritone First soldier Robin Donald tenor Second soldier John Delaney tenor Lictor, officer of imperial justice Anthony Davey bass Pallas Athene, goddess of wisdom Shirley Chapman soprano Chorus of Sadler’s Wells Opera Orchestra of Sadler’s Wells Opera Raymond Leppard 3 compact disc one Time Page Act I 1 Sinfonia 2:55 p. 30 Prologue 2 ‘Virtue, go hide yourself away’ 7:16 p. 30 Fortune, Virtue, Love Scene 1 3 ‘Again I’m drawn here’ 8:32 p. 31 Ottone, Soldier 2, Soldier 1 4 ‘My lord, do not go yet!’ 9:54 p. 32 Poppea, Nero Scene 2 5 ‘At last my hopes have ended’ 6:38 p. 34 Poppea, Arnalta Scene 3 6 ‘Oh, dishonoured Ottavia!’ 7:26 p. 35 Ottavia, Drusilla 7 ‘There stands that most ill-fated lady’ 5:43 p. 36 Seneca, Ottavia, Valletto 8 ‘The purple robes of emperors’ 8:07 p. 37 Seneca, Pallas Athene, Nero Scene 4 9 ‘Did I please you, my lord?’ 9:01 p. 39 Poppea, Nero 4 Time Page Scene 5 10 ‘Though Fate allows all others to drink the wine’ 8:44 p. 40 Ottone, Poppea, Drusilla Scene 6 11 ‘I can feel I don’t know what’ 4:42 p. 42 Valletto, Damigella TT 79:05 compact disc two Scene 7 1 ‘Solitude, beloved and treasured’ 13:55 p. 43 Seneca, Liberto, Chorus Act II Scene 1 2 Sinfonia – ‘Since old Seneca’s dead now’ 5:53 p. 45 Nero, Lucano Scene 2 3 ‘You, who received your rank and your honour’ 8:57 p. 45 Ottavia, Ottone, Drusilla Scene 3 4 ‘Since old Seneca’s dead now’ 9:11 p. 47 Poppea, Arnalta, Love 5 ‘Here I am, here have I come’ 3:40 p. 48 Ottone, Love, Poppea, Arnalta 5 Scene 4 6 ‘Oh happy, happy is Drusilla!’ 7:37 p. 49 Drusilla, Arnalta, Lictor, Nero, Ottone 7 ‘My lord, now you have good reason’ 5:18 p. 52 Poppea, Nero 8 ‘Think of her, think of my Poppea’ 3:39 p. 52 Arnalta Scene 5 9 ‘Ah, ah, my country’ 4:27 p. 53 Ottavia Scene 6 10 Sinfonia – ‘To you, to you Poppea, our Empress’ 4:16 p. 53 Chorus 11 ‘My beloved’ 5:20 p. 54 Poppea, Nero TT 72:26 6 Zoe Dominic 7 JANET BAKER In November 1971, Dame Janet Baker – a great champion of opera sung in English – performed the title role in Monteverdi’s The Coronation of Poppea with Sadler’s Wells Opera at the London Coliseum, conducted by Raymond Leppard. Happily, the production was broadcast live on BBC Radio 3 and we are delighted that by this latest addition to our Archive Edition, we have been able to provide new listeners the experience of hearing Dame Janet’s artistry, at the height of her career. Sir Peter Moores, CBE, DL June 2010 Sir Peter Moores with a portrait of Admiral Lord Nelson by Lemuel Francis Abbott, acquired for Compton Verney © Lyndon Parker 8 9 Re-imagining Poppea Seventeenth-century opera, most especially the Poppea in a reconstruction by Raymond Leppard. surviving works of Claudio Monteverdi, was one So successful were these performances that the of the great musical rediscoveries of the twentieth opera was revived at the two subsequent festivals, century. This rebirth echoed the renaissance of and it led to Glyndebourne commissioning the sung drama of the ancient Greeks and its Leppard to realise Francesco Cavalli’s L’Ormindo translation into opera in late-sixteenth and early- in 1967 and La Calisto in 1970, as well as a new seventeenth-century Italy. In each case, it was version of Monteverdi’s Il ritorno d’Ulisse in patria a laborious process to re-imagine the historical in 1972. Within a decade, Leppard had opened artefact from limited and fragmented access to the window to a whole new dimension of opera. original sources. Sadler’s Wells Opera jumped on the The early steps were taken in adaptations bandwagon in 1965, when it engaged Leppard to by composers such as Vincent d’Indy, Gian prepare and conduct his version of Monteverdi’s Francesco Malipiero, Ernst Krenek, Ottorino first operaLa favola d’Orfeo, controversially Respighi, Luigi Dallapiccola and Carl Orff. breaking its own English-language rule to Unsurprisingly, they reinterpreted Monteverdi perform it in Italian at Leppard’s insistence. through their own sound worlds. My own first Leppard argued that the structure of the encounter with The Coronation of Poppea came vocal line with its feminine endings and the through the recorded version prepared by the madrigalian nature of this early Monteverdi composer and conductor Walter Goehr. A were indissolubly linked to Alessandro Striggio’s refugee from Nazi Germany, Goehr had been a original text. By contrast, Giovanni Busenello’s pupil of Schoenberg, and he was an advocate of text for Poppea is more narrative and uses a freer contemporary music. and more characterised recitative, which Leppard But the breakthrough event which ensured was happy to perform in the English translation the wider popularity of Monteverdi’s operas in of Geoffrey Dunn when invited to direct a new the United Kingdom was the production at the production of this later opera at the London 1962 Glyndebourne Festival of L’incoronazione di Coliseum in 1971. 10 For the Coliseum, Leppard made a number as Nero: ‘One day it might be, but there’s a of changes. He reinstated the prologue for long way to go’. He was less convinced about the three goddesses, instead of opening persevering with a baritone Ottone. At the time with Ottone beneath Poppea’s window as at of the first Glyndebourne production, he judged Glyndebourne; he expanded the drinking duet that strong male altos were not around, that for Nero and Lucano at the start of his Act those who existed were simply ‘too Anglican’. II to include a dumb-play recapitulating the He conceded that, by the 1970s, the choice was action by adapting a sinfonia from a Monteverdi greater and that ‘next time a male alto would be ballo; and he enlarged the body of strings to fill a good idea’. His choice for Arnalta was based the bigger theatre with their lush sound. The on both practical and aesthetic judgments. The Sadler’s Wells orchestra for this assignment role lies unusually low, and tenors in drag were comprised 7 first violins; 7 second violins; associated with exclusively comic roles. While 4 first violas; 4 second violas; 4 ’cellos; and that might be appropriate for Arnalta’s final 4 double basses. The continuo section scene, he believed it would diminish the beauty constituted 2 harpsichords; 1 harp; 2 organs of her lullaby. Listening to the clear and steady (a reed organ and a flue organ); 1 lute doubling line of Anne Collins’s contralto, it is easy to be chitarrone; 1 guitar; 2 ’cellos; and 2 basses. persuaded. What Leppard did not change were his The principal female roles of Poppea and transpositions of the pitch of the voices and Ottavia each avoid extremes of high or low gender of the singers. So, Nero is a tenor notes and may be satisfactorily cast with either instead of a soprano as in Monteverdi; Ottone soprano or mezzo-soprano. The important a baritone rather than an alto; Arnalta a female thing is to ensure a contrast of vocal colour and alto as opposed to a tenor in travesti; Ottavia’s of personality. Janet Baker’s patrician style and page a tenor rather than a soprano. He was aware high-minded temperament would appear to of the historical incongruities, but believed make her a natural Ottavia, and indeed she has that during these early days of establishing recorded magnificent versions of her two great Monteverdi in the operatic canon ‘we are not laments on a recital disc. So, casting her as the yet preaching to the converted’. He thought it flighty Poppea represented a challenge to the simply not viable dramatically to cast a woman audience’s prejudices. I attended three of the 11 performances in December 1971 and remember natural vibrato. Ferguson went on to become a feeling a slight discomfort that this noble artist founding member and versatile house tenor at was demeaning herself in sordid sexual antics, Opera North. McDonnell was to be Andrei in but that may have been a reflection on Colin English National Opera’s landmark production Graham’s perhaps over-decorous production. Yet, of Prokofiev’sWar and Peace. On the other hand, listening to this recording almost forty years later, neither would you be likely to enjoy the luxury I find myself entranced by the subtle sensuality of casting of John Brecknock as Ottavia’s page.