Ormus

Axur, re d'Ormus is an operatic dramma tragicomico in five acts by Antonio Salieri. The libretto was by Lorenzo da Ponte. Axur is the Italian version of Salieri's 1787 French-language work Tarare which had a libretto by Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais. Axur premiered at the Burgtheater in Vienna on 8 January 1788, the title role being sung by Francesco Benucci, Mozart's first Figaro. It became one of the most famous operas in Vienna, being performed much more frequently than Mozart's Don Giovanni, which was first performed in Vienna on 7 May 1788.

German clarinetist Dieter Klöcker founded his Consortium Classicum in the 1960s and has occasionally devoted it to the rediscovery of obscure repertory for wind instruments. The group has made several recordings of Harmoniemusik or wind-band (paired oboes, clarinets, horns, and bassoons) arrangements of operas of the late 18th century, many of which were made by oboist and composer Johann Nepomuk Wendt. Mozart's operas underwent these arrangements, sometimes even at Mozart's own hands (he pulled an all-nighter to rush one out for Die Entführung aus dem Serail to beat a competitor), for wind bands were maintained by numerous Austrian noble establishments. This impeccably played recording gives a taste of music that might easily have been heard at a Viennese soiree in the weeks after the premiere of an opera by Antonio Salieri, Mozart's putative rival.

After Les Danaïdes and Les Horaces, Les Talens Lyriques concludes the group’s cycle of Antonio Salieri’s French operas with the world premiere recording of Tarare. Often unfairly overshadowed by his brilliant contemporary Mozart, Salieri here composed a genuine masterpiece on the only libretto ever written by Beaumarchais.
Salieri has a taste for exoticism and, like Mozart in Die Entführung aus dem Serail, he transports us into a fantasy Orient seen through the eyes of the pre-revolutionary philosophy of the Enlightenment.

Bass-baritone Adam Plachetka presents Molieri, a programme of opera arias by Mozart and Salieri, together with the Czech Ensemble Baroque under the baton of Roman Válek. Thanks to fictional works such as the film Amadeus, Antonio Salieri is often scapegoated as the man who allegedly caused Mozart’s untimely death out of professional envy. Despite the fact that this is obviously not true, Salieri’s popularity has suffered from this popular myth-making, and most of his operas have sunk into oblivion. Molieri brings the two composers together, focusing on bass-8 baritone arias from their opera buffas. Famous arias from Mozart’s Da Ponte operas are heard in a completely different light when paired to excerpts from Salieri’s Falstaff, Axur, La grotto di Trofonio and La scuola de’ gelosi. It also makes clear why Salieri enjoyed such success, as well as why great composers such as Beethoven, Schubert and Liszt all wanted to study with him. Given the importance of Prague for Mozart’s operatic successes, the music fits the players of Czech Ensemble Baroque like a glove, and Plachetka possesses the optimal combination of vocal authority and agility to sing these buffo roles.