Germania

NICOLA PORPORA'S Germanico in Germania is the latest Baroque opera seria to get worked over by a conductor who confuses over-caffeination with excitement. There’s little drama, shape or contrast when everything’s so loud and frantic, and the whole work sounds like one long string of agitated arie di tempeste. Even without understanding Italian, it’s easy to tell what a Baroque aria is about by the instrumental setup and the vocal writing.

Handel’s Ottone was one of the most popular operas of the composer’s career, with 34 known performances during his lifetime, beaten only by the 53 performances of Rinaldo. The premiere run in 1723 featured superstar Italian soloists including Senesino and Cuzzoni, and coincided with (and was perhaps the cause of) the height of London’s opera madness, with tickets changing hands for increasingly high prices on the black market. This recording of the 1723 version (Handel adapted the opera in later years for different singers) features James Bowman at the peak of his powers in the title role.

Playing a melodious synthesis of symphonic hard rock that has occcasionally been compared to Pink Floyd, Hanover Krautrockers Jane can trace their origins back to the late sixties psychedelic band Justice Of Peace. Releasing a single Save Me/War, the band featured future Jane members Peter Panka on vocals, Klaus Hess on bass and Werner Nadolny on saxophone…