Robert Matthew

Metronome announces a new CD and download release of “Confidences Galantes” of the music of Robert de Visée for theorbo performed by Fred Jacobs. Robert de Visée was a court musician and composer for Louis XIV and a member of the King’s personal chamber ensemble “La Chambre du Roi” along with Francois Couperin, Marin Marais, and Antoine Forqueray. In 1716 he published his “Pièces de Théorbe” after more than thirty years service in the king’s service. He is documented as performing at the royal bedside.

Handel's Old Testament oratorios can be difficult to tell apart–tenor Israelite hero, bass enemy or éminence grise, soprano ingenue, and alto priest or youth. What distinguishes Joshua? Real characters: tenor Joshua, confident to the point of conceit; grizzled old general Caleb, wistfully facing retirement; alto Othniel, an excited young warrior/lover fighting battles to win Caleb's giddy daughter, Achsah. Joshua's highlights are the showpiece arias. James Bowman sails through Othniel's impetuous "Let danger surround me"; Emma Kirkby (one of the best ornamenters in the business) charms and fascinates in Achsah's "Oh, had I Jubal's lyre" and "Hark! 'tis the linnet"; George Ainsley is a Joshua both vigorous and graceful, the chorus and the brass are stunning in "Glory to God" as they bring the walls of Jericho tumbling down. –Matthew Westphal

Winton Dean, the, ahem, dean of modern Handel scholarship, considered Joseph and His Brethren one of Handel's weakest oratorios. Don't believe it: the music is wonderful, and even the libretto isn't nearly as bad as Dean makes out. The King's Consort gives the same high-quality performance it always gives to Handel's oratorios. James Bowman sounds particularly comfortable in the title role; while all the soloists are good, soprano Yvonne Kenny (who gets all the best arias) is terrific. –Matthew Westphal

Handel's oratorios may be loaded with wonderful music, but their librettos have tended to draw some sniping. It's true that some of them can be rather banal, but others are very impressive–the biblical texts Charles Jennens assembled for Messiah and Israel in Egypt, for example, and John Dryden's ode Alexander's Feast. One particularly inspired idea Handel's colleagues had was to take excerpts from John Milton's poems "L'Allegro" (about the joys of sophisticated hedonism) and "Il Penseroso" (about the joys of contemplative solitude) and interweave them to make a sort of musical debate. At Handel's request, Jennens wrote a concluding section titled "Il Moderato," which unites the two opposing temperaments under the guidance of "Sweet Temp'rance." ..