Jupiter Rising

Little wonder that the fast-rising mezzo-soprano Lea Desandre, being of French-Italian descent, chose to present a sumptuous selection of French and Italian arias from the baroque era, ranging from the Neapolitans Francesco Provenzale and Giuseppe de Bottis or Venice’s fabled Vivaldi, to France’s celebrated Grand Siècle luminaries such as Couperin, Destouches and Philidor, and reaching as far as Germany where Saxon composer Georg Caspar Schürmann and Italian-born Carlo Pallavicino developed their careers – at Saxon courts, indeed, but still in the realm of Italian opera that was then all the rage.

There's something just the slightest bit comic about calling an Emmylou Harris album Stumble into Grace. While Harris has always sounded as if both earthly and spiritual grace were created with her in mind, when she sings, it seems she can no more stumble than a dolphin can be taught to walk on dry land. Stumble into Grace finds Harris following in the same creative path she began to pursue with Wrecking Ball and Red Dirt Girl, which is to say that the influence of her country-influenced material is more felt than heard as she dips her toes into the spectral and atmospheric accents of folk, indie pop, and world music…