Anna Una Tipa Come ME

Semele was first presented in London in 1744; it was billed as an oratorio for murky reasons, but indeed it is operatic. I believe that this is the third recording of the work: John Eliot Gardiner’s (on Erato) is severely cut, and although much of the singing is good, it can’t compare with John Nelson’s complete, gorgeous performance (on DG) played on modern instruments. This latter is a lithe, brilliant show with Kathleen Battle in her greatest recording as the vain, self-destructive Semele and Marilyn Horne and Samuel Ramey close to magnificent, with tenor John Aler an elegant if slightly underpowered Jupiter.

Anna Bolena premiered in 1830 and was Donizetti’s first great success–and it remains one of his finest works. Aside from his usual endless fount of melodies, we find through-composed scenes wherein recitative seamlessly melds into arioso and into aria or ensemble. Anna manages to come across as a real character, as does the unfortunate Jane Seymour, who has the (bad) luck to be Henry VIII’s new love; and Henry’s music, too, is composed effectively for this royal villain. Less successfully portrayed but still with a couple of fine arias and some stunning ensemble music is Anna’s brother Percy. He’s an earthbound character but his music is wonderful and difficult (it was composed for the legendary Rubini).

Il mondo della luna (The World in the Moon), Hob. 28/7, is an opera buffa by Joseph Haydn with a libretto by Carlo Goldoni, first performed at Eszterháza, Hungary on 3 August 1777. It was first written for the composer Baldassarre Galuppi and performed in Venice in the Carnival 1750, then adapted for Haydn's version of the opera for the wedding celebrations of Count Nikolaus Esterházy, the younger son of Haydn's patron, Prince Nikolaus Esterházy...

Born in Lisbon of Italian parentage, Pedro António Avondano was employed at the court of Joseph I, becoming Portugal’s leading composer of instrumental music and dances for the royal ballet. Il mondo della luna (‘The World on the Moon’) was a hugely successful libretto by Carlo Goldoni and was set by the likes of Haydn—its comic tale seeing the social climber and strict moralist Buona Fede duped into thinking that he is on the moon. This narrative of illusion in collision with love, jealousy and power struggles is set with sublime lyrical and dramatic transparency by Avondano in this, his only opera.

LiBerté is the sixteenth studio album of the Italian singer Loredana Bertè, released on September 28, 2018.

For the sake of both vocal and family well-being, Anne Sofie von Otter has always followed the wise course of self-rationing in opera. This disc, an entirely personal selection of arias from the Viennese Classical period, means all the more to her including, as it does, arias sung by dramatic and passionate women 'most of whom', she admits in the accompanying notes, 'I have never performed on stage and, alas, probably never will'.