Señales de Humo

Re-imagining the fabled tale of a folklore favourite has been the latest creative challenge for Chris de Burgh. The compelling result breathes music and lyrical life into a centuries-old and much-loved classic. The Legend of Robin Hood finds Chris at his imaginative best, re-telling the story with cinematic vision coupled seamlessly to music of emotional depth and power. The concept for the 27th studio album by Chris emerged from his involvement in 'Robin Hood', a stage musical about the infamous Sherwood Forest nobleman and his band of outlaws. Chris was invited to contribute storylines and melodies to the musical, which will be produced later in the year."Since I was writing songs for this," he explains, "I thought 'Why not expand the story and put an album out, too?'"

The successful film Tous les matins du monde had the undisputed merit of bringing the world’s attention to the figure of Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe and to the viola da gamba in general, since Sainte-Colombe provided substantial contributions to the repertoire of this instrument. Still, the film’s plot was explicitly (and fully legitimately) grounded on a fictional work, a novel telling the history of Sainte-Colombe with references to what was, by then, known about him. Fortunately, a virtuous circle was ignited by the film, prompting new and meticulous research on his figure and effectively bringing to light some hard facts about his life.

To mark the centenary of the death of Camille Saint-Saëns, the Palazzetto Bru Zane offers a chance to discover one of his most performed and admired operas in his lifetime, presented here in a rare version. Completed in 1893 and premiered the same year at the Opéra-Comique, the piece amusingly recounts the love affair between Nicias and Phryné, who dupes the old archon Dicephilus in order to avenge his cruelty. Its witty melodies and delightful orchestration made the opera an immediate success in Paris and then throughout France. It was enriched with recitatives composed by André Messager in 1896 to promote its career in theatres abroad. Hervé Niquet’s dashing interpretation brings out to the full the qualities of the Orchestre de l’Opéra de Rouen Normandie and the Chœur du Concert Spirituel, thus providing a sparkling backdrop for the virtuosic soprano voice of Florie Valiquette, the refined lyricism of the tenor Cyrille Dubois and the vocal authority of Thomas Dolié’s baritone.

Semele is a masterpiece. For what else can one call a drama in which the perfect symbiosis of text and music conjures up such suggestive power? ‘To hold the mind, the ears and the eyes equally spellbound’: this recommendation by La Bruyère (Les Caractères: ‘Les ouvrages de l'esprit’) refers to the ‘machine plays’ so adored by the public in the Baroque period. But even without machinery or indeed without sets or real staging, Handel’s oratorio involves us in the tragic fate of his heroine with supreme skill.