D’amici

Star countertenor Max Emanuel Cencic steps into new musical territory with the world premiere recording of Catone in Utica by Leonardo Vinci, a forgotten genius of Italian opera. The opera tells a powerful tale of Julius Caesar’s defeat of the Republican forces led by Marcus Porcius Cato in 46 BC, exploring the eternal themes of love, duty and honor. Featuring five countertenors along with conductor Riccardo Minasi who leads il pomo d’oro.

Joyce DiDonato has staked a powerful claim on the multi-faceted title role of Handel’s opera Agrippina. In the words of The Telegraph, she sings it with “authority, grandeur and high style”. She recently performed it to critical acclaim at The Royal Opera House, Covent Garden with Maxim Emelyanychev, Chief Conductor of Il Pomo d’Oro. Joining them on this recording is a cast of established and rising stars that includes Marie-Nicole Lemieux, Franco Fagioli, Luca Pisaroni, Elsa Benoit and Jakub Józef Orliński.

Handel's 1738 opera Serse (Xerxes) baffled audiences at first hearing with its mixture of tragedy and comedy, but that same mixture has resulted in the opera's steadily rising status in performance today. If you're maxed out on athletic opera seria performances, check it out: it has elements of a put-on of that genre. The plot is kicked off by Serse, the king of ancient Persia, praising a shade tree in the famous aria "Ombra mai fu," whose tune is also known as Handel. The role of Serse is written for a male countertenor (originally the castrato Caffarelli), who has to keep a level of seriousness as his character becomes involved in increasingly improbably romantic triangles.