The Return of Handel's Giove in Argo
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GEORGE FRIDERIC HANDEL 1685-1759 Giove in Argo Jupiter in Argos Opera in Three Acts Libretto by Antonio Maria Lucchini First performed at the King’s Theatre, London, 1 May 1739 hwv a14 Reconstructed with additional recitatives by John H. Roberts Arete (Giove) Anicio Zorzi Giustiniani tenor Iside Ann Hallenberg mezzo-soprano Erasto (Osiri) Vito Priante bass Diana Theodora Baka mezzo-soprano Calisto Karina Gauvin soprano Licaone Johannes Weisser baritone IL COMPLESSO BAROCCO Alan Curtis direction 2 Ouverture 1 Largo – Allegro (3:30) 1 2 A tempo di Bourrée (1:29) ATTO PRIMO 3 Coro Care selve, date al cor (2:01) 4 Recitativo: Licaone Imbelli Dei! (0:48) 5 Aria: Licaone Affanno tiranno (3:56) 6 Coro Oh quanto bella gloria (3:20) 7 Recitativo: Diana Della gran caccia, o fide (0:45) 8 Aria: Diana Non ingannarmi, cara speranza (7:18) 9 Coro Oh quanto bella gloria (1:12) 10 Aria: Iside Deh! m’aiutate, o Dei (2:34) 11 Recitativo: Iside Fra il silenzio di queste ombrose selve (1:01) 12 Arioso: Iside Vieni, vieni, o de’ viventi (1:08) 13 Recitativo: Arete Iside qui, fra dolce sonno immersa? (0:23) 14 Aria: Arete Deh! v’aprite, o luci belle (3:38) 15 Recitativo: Iside, Arete Olà? Chi mi soccorre? (1:39) 16 Aria: Iside Taci, e spera (3:39) 17 Arioso: Calisto Tutta raccolta ancor (2:03) 18 Recitativo: Calisto, Erasto Abbi, pietoso Cielo (1:52) 19 Aria: Calisto Lascia la spina (2:43) 20 Recitativo: Erasto, Arete Credo che quella bella (1:23) 21 Aria: Arete Semplicetto! a donna credi? (6:11) 22 Recitativo: Erasto Che intesi mai? (0:23) 23 Aria: Erasto Al par della mia sorte (5:16) 24 Recitativo: Iside Una cara promessa (0:57) 25 Aria: Iside Nel passar da un laccio all’altro (6:01) 3 26 Coro Lieto esulti il cor (1:07) ATTO SECONDO 1 Coro: Pastori Corre, vola qui ’l piacere (1:28) 2 2 Recitativo: Diana, Calisto Dell’Arcade feroce (0:44) 3 Aria: Calisto Già sai che l’usignol (3:56) 4 Recitativo: Calisto, Diana Ma s’al fin mi piegassi (0:40) 5 Aria: Diana Io parto lieta sulla tua fede (5:46) 6 Coro: Pastori Corre, vola qui ’l piacere (1:02) 7 Recitativo: Arete, Calisto, Iside Qual mai rara beltà m’accende il core? (1:58) 8 Aria: Arete Sempre dolci ed amorose (6:45) 9 Recitativo: Erasto, Iside, Calisto Ecco l’infida (1:15) 10 Aria: Calisto Tornami a vagheggiar (4:53) 11 Recitativo: Erasto Che vuoi di più, crudele? (0:20) 12 Aria: Erasto Col tuo sangue smorzare vorrei (4:23) 13 Recitativo accompagnato: Iside, Erasto Svenato il genitor (1:16) 14 Recitativo accompagnato: Iside Iside, dove sei? (2:45) (Francesco Araja) 15 Aria: Iside Ombra che pallida (4:10) (Francesco Araja) 16 Coro Viver, e non amar (4:51) 4 ATTO TERZO 1 Coro Oggi udirannosi (2:51) 3 2 Recitativo: Licaone, Calisto Dovunque io volga il passo (1:17) 3 Aria: Calisto Combattuta da più venti (7:00) 4 Recitativo: Arete, Calisto, Iside Che risolvi, o Calisto (1:00) 5 Aria: Iside Questa d’un fido amore (4:58) (Francesco Araja) 6 Recitativo: Arete, Calisto Deh! vezzoso mio ben (0:29) 7 Duetto: Arete, Calisto Vado e vivo con la speranza (2:33) 8 Recitativo: Diana, Calisto Conversar co’ pastori (0:50) 9 Aria: Diana In braccio al tuo spavento (3:31) 10 Recitativo accompagnato: Calisto Priva d’ogni conforto (1:13) 11 Aria: Calisto Ah! non son io che parlo (5:45) 12 Recitativo: Erasto Agitato, confuso, io sieguo l’orme (0:52) 13 Aria: Erasto Così suole a rio vicina (4:15) 14 Recitativo accompagnato: Calisto Non è d’un’alma grande (1:12) 15 Coro S’unisce al tuo martir (1:46) 16 Recitativo: Iside, Erasto, Licaone, Calisto, Diana, Arete Ah! che mal mi difendo! (1:51) 17 Aria: Iside Al gaudio, al riso, al canto (2:09) 18 Coro D’Amor, di Giove al vanto (0:38) 5 6 Alan Curtis IL COMPLESSO BAROCCO Alan Curtis direction Violins I Dmitry Sinkovsky, Alfia Bakieva, Daniela Nuzzoli, Laura Corolla Violins II Boris Begelman, Isabella Bison, Yayoi Masuda Violas Giulio D’Alessio, Elisa Imbalzano Cellos Catherine Jones, Ludovico Minasi Double bass Riccardo Coelati Rama Oboes Yann Miriel, Takahiro Kitazato Bassoons Andrea Bressan, Michele Fattori Flute Manuel Granatiero Horns Dileno Baldin, Francesco Meucci Trumpet Hannes Rux Archlute Pier Luigi Ciapparelli Harpsichords Andrea Perugi, Alan Curtis CORO DEL COMPLESSO BAROCCO Sopranos Karina Gauvin, Maria Laura Martorana, Elena Biscuola Altos Ann Hallenberg, Theodora Baka, Anna Simboli Tenors Anicio Zorzi Giustiniani, Enea Scala Basses Vito Priante, Johannes Weisser 7 The Return of Handel’s Giove in Argo When today’s consumers hear the word ‘pasticcio’ they probably think first of food – un pasticcio di lasagne, say – and then of a type of eighteenth-century opera in which a series of existing arias, usually provided by the partici pating singers, are inserted into an old libretto and fitted out with new recitatives by an obliging composer. Handel’s Falstaffian girth in later life might suggest that he would have relished culinary pasticci, but contrary to what is often said he never assembled indiscriminate operatic compilations of the second kind. During his years in London he did adapt and perform several operas by other composers incorporating numerous arias from the singers’ repertories, works that might best be described simply as ‘arrangements.’ But the only true pasticcio operas he created were drawn primarily from his own earlier music, and it was he rather than the performers who played the dominant role in selecting what to include and fitting it all together. There are three such Handel operas: Oreste (1734), Alessandro Severo (1738) and Giove in Argo (1739), often referred to by its English title Jupiter in Argos. Handel’s original conducting scores of Oreste and Alessandro Severo are preserved, but with Giove we have only the printed libretto and assorted manu script fragments. For many years it was assumed that the opera could not plausibly be reconstructed: the secco recitatives for the second and third acts are almost entirely missing and, most importantly, two of the arias shown in the libretto appeared to be irretrievably lost. In 2000, however, I discovered these arias in the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, though they turned out to be not by Handel but by his younger Italian contemporary, Francesco Araja (born 1709). It thus became possible, with a certain amount of imaginative intervention, to produce a scholarly edition of Giove in Argo, and in 2002 I undertook that task for the Hallische Händel- Ausgabe. Giove in Argo belongs to the final phase of Handel’s career as a composer of Italian opera. After four seasons of bitter and mutually destructive rivalry between Handel and the so-called Opera of the Nobility the two companies had in effect merged for 1737-38 under the management of John Jacob Heidegger, who held the lease on the King’s Theatre in the Haymarket. But despite 8 new operas by Handel and two other resident composers, Giovanni Battista Pescetti and Francesco Maria Veracini, the reception had been lukewarm, and Heidegger was unable to enlist enough subscribers to support an opera season the following year. Handel accordingly planned a season consisting entirely of unstaged works in English, which opened with the newly-composed Saul on 16 January 1739. Soon, however, he found himself challenged by a company performing Italian opera at John Rich’s theater in Covent Garden, where Handel had led his own per formances in 1734-37. This troupe seems to have been conjured up overnight by Charles Sackville, Earl of Middlesex, who had just returned from Italy, followed by his mistress Lucia Panichi, a deplor able singer styled with minimal justification ‘La Moscovita.’ As his first offering on 10 March Middlesex presented Angelica e Medoro by Pescetti, with La Moscovita as the inevitable prima donna and the other singers largely recruited from Handel’s company. Hostile intent was evident from the start, since Angelica e Medoro played on Saturdays, when Handel had been giving his oratorios, and the fourth and last performance was scheduled for the same Wednes day night (11 April) as the second performance of Handel’s other new oratorio, Israel in Egypt. Once again the vandals had invaded Handel’s domain, and he immediately struck back, making known his intention to put on Italian operas himself when the theaters reopened after Easter. To launch his counter-attack he composed Giove in Argo. The libretto was by Antonio Maria Lucchini and had been set by Antonio Lotti for Dresden in 1717. Handel must have seen and heard this opera during his extended visit to Dresden in 1719, when it was performed as part of the lavish celebrations surrounding the marriage of the electoral prince Friedrich August to Maria Josepha, daughter of the late emperor Joseph I, along with Lotti’s Teofane, whose libretto Handel later set as Ottone (1723). Handel was well acquainted with at least one aria in Lotti’s Giove, since he quoted from it in the 1720 version of his oratorio Esther, as well as in the collaborative Royal Academy opera Muzio Scevola (1721). Initially, it appears, the idea was to use a predominantly English cast for the London Giove, luring back some of the singers who had strayed to Middlesex, but when Handel was midway through the score his plans changed abruptly, thanks to the fortuitous arrival in London on 17 April of a family of Italian musicians: the violinist Giovanni Piantanida (who was immediately invited to play a concerto in Saul), his wife Costanza Posterla, a veteran Italian singer, 9 and their youthful daughter, also a singer but almost totally lacking in operatic experience.