H a N D E L C a N T a T E 0 2 M I T Ch E L L S a N D L E R
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ayros C o n t r a s t o a r m o n i C o m a r C o v i t a l e H a n d e l C a n t a t e 0 2 m i t ch e l l s a n d l e r Spande ancor a mio dispetto Dalla guerra amorosa Nell’africane selve Cuopre tal volta il cielo 1 ContrastoArmonicoCantate02bookletNW.indd 1 27-05-15 08:40 C o n t r a s t o a r m o n i C o G e o r G F r i e d r i ch H a n d e l (1685-1759) C a n t a t e 0 2 Sonata in La minore op. 4 nr. 5 (arcangelo Corelli) Spande ancor a mio dispetto hwv 165 Dalla guerra amorosa hwv 102a Sonata in La maggiore op. 4 nr. 3 (arcangelo Corelli) Nell’africane selve hwv 136a Cuopre tal volta il cielo hwv 98 mitchell sandler bass-baritone Contrasto armonico marco vitale harpsichord & direction stefan Plewniak, enrique Gómez-Cabrero Fernández, aliona Kalechyts-Piatrouskaya violins Pierre-augustine Lay cello 2 ContrastoArmonicoCantate02bookletNW.indd 2 27-05-15 08:40 G e o r G F r i e d r i ch Sonata Op. 4 nr. 5 in La minore Sonata Op. 4 nr. 3 in La maggiore H a n d e l (arcangelo Corelli) (arcangelo Corelli) (1685-1759) 1 Preludio 2.28 13 Preludio 4.50 2 Allemanda 1.42 14 Corrente 1.28 C a n t a t e 0 2 3 Corrente 1.20 15 Sarabanda 2.05 4 Gavotta 0.53 16 Tempo di Gavotta 1.56 Spande ancor a mio dispetto hwv 165 Nell’africane selve hwv 136a Sonata in La minore op. 4 nr. 5 (arcangelo Corelli) 5 aria: Spande ancor a mio dispetto 4.18 17 recitativo: Nell’Africane selve 1.44 Spande ancor a mio dispetto hwv 165 6 accompagnato: O! che da fiere pene 1.44 18 aria: Langue trema 10.12 Dalla guerra amorosa hwv 102a 7 aria: Da balza in balza 4.03 19 recitativo: Nice là, fra confine 1.08 Sonata in La maggiore op. 4 nr. 3 (arcangelo Corelli) 20 aria: Chiedo amore, altro non bramo 3.14 Dalla guerra amorosa hwv 102a Nell’africane selve hwv 136a Cuopre tal volta il cielo hwv 98 Cuopre tal volta il cielo hwv 98 8 recitativo: Dalla guerra amorosa 0.33 9 aria: Non v’alletti un occhio nero 3.38 21 accompagnato: Cuopre tal volta il cielo 1.17 mitchell sandler bass-baritone 10 recitativo: Fuggite, si fuggite 0.44 22 aria: Tuona, balena 3.25 11 aria: La bellezza è com’un fiore 2.20 23 recitativo: Così fiera procella 1.18 12 recitativo: Fuggite, si fuggite, 24 aria: Per pietà de’miei martiri 4.14 Contrasto armonico a chi servo d’amor 1.04 marco vitale harpsichord & direction Total timing 61.51 stefan Plewniak, enrique Gómez-Cabrero Fernández, aliona Kalechyts-Piatrouskaya violins Pierre-augustine Lay cello 3 ContrastoArmonicoCantate02bookletNW.indd 3 27-05-15 08:40 4 ContrastoArmonicoCantate02bookletNW.indd 4 27-05-15 08:40 handel cantate 02 he bass voice is rather modestly represented within the corpus of Handel’s solo T cantatas. only four such works have come down to us from his years in italy, but these are certainly compositions of great brilliance. the enormous vocal demands of two of the pieces are legendary. Handel joined all his genius for characterisation to an operatic grasp of the dramatic situation in each cantata. He did not hesitate to translate his poet’s extreme imagery into music which exploits all the shades of the bass voice. in so doing, these early works prefigure the later operatic bass roles of his london period. Barely twenty years old, he made the same demands of his bass singers in rome and naples as he later did for the powerful voices of Boschi and montagnana. How wonderful it would be to be able to read firsthand information about the original performances in the selected Conversazioni and Accademie of Handel’s patrons. alas, no unequivocal source exists. at least the researchers have been able to find circumstantial evidence pointing to the singer for whom Handel wrote his two most spectacular bass cantatas. ‘nell’africane selve’ with Basso Continuo (bwv 136a) and the Cantata con violini ‘Cuopre tal volta il cielo’ (hwv 98) were evidently written in the summer of 1708 in naples for domenico antonio manna. During his two-month stay in naples, Handel produced his serenata ‘aci, Galatea, e Polifemo’, a splendid production of which marco vitale has made an exemplary recording. it features an incredibly difficult bass role: Polifemo. Quite early on researchers noticed the similarity between this role and the enormous range of the solo bass part in the two cantatas mentioned above – a similarity also borne out by the three manuscripts: all are on the same paper. Bit by bit the Handel scholars were able to shed light on the subject, and identify a singer who must have been the bass soloist at the first performance. the occasion would have been the elaborate wedding festivities for duke alvito, in his palace in Chiaia in mid July, 1708. there was also a repeat performance in december, 1711, at yet another princely wedding celebration in Piedimonte. it is known that the bass domenico antonio manna was engaged for both festivities, even though it cannot be proved that manna performed the role of Polifemo. on the other hand, he is known to have performed in other music at these events. in this way the italian musicologist Carlo vitali has identified manna as the most probable first performer of the two cantatas composed in naples. 5 ContrastoArmonicoCantate02bookletNW.indd 5 27-05-15 08:40 These two cantatas have always represented such an intimidating testimony to the abilities of their first performer that few bass singers have wished to attempt them. this is due to their huge range and to Handel’s clever ‘dramatisation’ of the various vocal colours through shrill contrasts, crazy leaps, and bizarre changes of register. Both cantatas combine one aria for high baritone with one for a voice of nearly impossible range. For example, the first aria of ‘nell’africane selve’ (hwv 136a) requires an absurd vocal compass: from low C# to tenor top a. the opening recitative paints a picture of the wilds of africa with sudden register shifts and diminished intervals. this corresponds to the textual ‘soundscape’ of the italian. the ‘ululati’ (cries) of wild animals are mimicked by descending diminished twelfths. the ‘sibili’ (hissing) of snakes become a hissing run of 16th notes. the singer becomes a painter of nature, as it were. Frightened birds cry above the imposing figure of the lion, ruler of the jungle. Yet his days as king are numbered. in the first aria we see how he desperately throws himself against the nets in which he is trapped. Handel vividly describes this in descending triads in f# minor. this idea came to him again more than a decade later, in his english oratorio ‘esther’, as a way of illustrating the fall of the traitor Haman. and yet he smoothed out the harmonies and vocal lines of ‘How art thou fall’n’, so that the original neapolitan version comes across as stronger than the later parody. In the cantata’s second recitative, the singer reveals that all the scary natural imagery – the lion, the african jungle – is nothing more or less than pure rhetoric. We’ve been listening all along to a shepherd, who is expressing to his beloved what love has done to him: made him into a weak, trapped lion. in the final aria he sings in the seductive baritone register: ‘i beg for love, more than this i do not desire!’. the vastly different ranges have just the dramatic effect that Handel intended; here we see the trapped lion, who tries to tear the net in which he is imprisoned - there the young shepherd, who sings persuasively to his beloved. ‘Cuopre talvolta il cielo’ (hwv 98) is built on the same model: the radical nature imagery at the opening of the cantata serves solely as a metaphor for the suffering of a young lover. Handel uses two violin lines in the urgent introductory recitative to paint a storm on the neapolitan coast, complete with whistling winds, foaming seas, lightning and thunder. out of the raging foam rises the image of the ‘dio tridentato’: neptune with his trident. He threatens not only those at sea, but devastates Juno’s domain on land as well. in the midst of this stormy violin music, the bass leaps to his low d, and foreshadows the register jumps of the first aria, ‘tuona, balena, sibilla il vento’. in the ‘storm’ tonality of d major, Handel 6 ContrastoArmonicoCantate02bookletNW.indd 6 27-05-15 08:40 combines wild triplets in the basso continuo, notated with a time signature of 6/8, with terse, abrupt chords in the violins, notating this in 2/4. the raging sea brings the singer to the very limits of his powers, if he is to succeed in the killing triplet coloratura and giant leaps. the second recitative explains the poetic simile: the shepherd reveals that lightning and thunder are the merciless glance and proud words of his beloved. the second aria is another surprising shift in key and mood. Both violin parts launch into an nearly endless figure of reproach in g minor, while the singer protests in expressive leaps of sixths and sevenths.