Handel's Serse (1738), about romantic intrigues at the court of the Persian king Xerxes, bombed at its first performances and wasn't revived until the 20th century. Serse, sung here by mezzo-soprano Emily D'Angelo (it was originally a castrato role), gets an imposing entrance aria, the famous "Ombra mai fu," but much of the opera is comic, and the mixture of elements flummoxed 18th century hearers, including the critic Charles Burney. Audiences wanted big tripartite da capo arias and serious Greek themes, but instead, what they got, were brief one-section arias that flashed by and various bits of coquetry and satire that originated in Italian comic traditions and looked forward to Mozartian opera buffa. Nowadays, the opera is one of Handel's more popular, and its structure fits the talents on this recording perfectly. It is hard to decide which is more of a draw, the crisp conducting of Harry Bicket, leading the venerable English Concert and keeping the proceedings moving along as Handel intended, or the singing from a veritable all-star cast, at least among the women (there are no countertenors). D'Angelo is glorious, and Mary Bevan is equally good as the flirt Atalanta. The smaller roles are strong, too, and really, there is not a weakness to be found. A very strong Handel opera recording. © James Manheim /TiVo

At the turn of the seventeenth century, the madrigal migrated from the seclusion of private rooms to the theatre. With this came new expectations in order to create a greater spectacle for viewers. Among them was the demand for increased dramatic expressiveness.Monteverdi's Seventh Book of Madrigals (1619) was written when the composer had settled in Venice. He finally enjoyed complete freedom directing the Cappella Marciana, the choir of St Mark's Basilica in Venice. This, combined with the artistic vivacity that runs through the City of the Doges provides a libretto that is fascinating in its polyphonic explorations and written complexity. This is a stark contrast to the Sixth Book, published five years earlier. The quest for a perfect, almost physical equivalence between the text and the music has led to instrumentation that serves as an ideal setting for the vocals.Always at the top of their game, Rinaldo Alessandrini and the Concerto Italiano beautifully perform this music sparkling with purity and beauty. Soprano Monica Piccinini’s ethereal tone particularly stands out. Her voice is truly indispensable to the ensemble's productions. © Pierre Lamy/Qobuz

The madrigals of Carlo Gesualdo were new territory for Les Arts Florissants, a group that specializes mostly in French Baroque opera, but the cycle, which concludes with this double album featuring the composer's tortured fifth and sixth books, has been consistently strong and has brought many new insights; the album reached the top levels of classical sales charts in early 2023. Gesualdo and his style have been used in narratives that don't necessarily fit the actual music. For Stravinsky and his contemporaries, the dissonance-loving Gesualdo was a proto-modernist, but Les Arts Florissants leader (and tenor voice) Paul Agnew points out that the trends in his music were also present in that of other composers of the Mannerist late 16th century. It is conventional to connect the experiments in Gesualdo's music to the facts of his life: he caught his wife and her lover in flagrante, murdered them both, beat the rap at trial, and spent the rest of his life in seclusion. Agnew doesn't buy this connection, either, and his interpretations avoid the emotional extremes present in other performances. At the most intense moments, he may steer the singers just a bit toward spoken inflections, but mostly his dissonant harmonies are precise and cutting. The sound is a bit swallowed up in the Philharmonie de Paris, but the laconic statements of Gesualdo's chosen texts are clear. A fine conclusion to a cycle of music by a composer who warranted a fresh look.© James Manheim /TiVo

Famous for its aria “Ombra mai fu”, known as “Handel’s Largo”, Serse (or Xerxes) is one of this German composer’s most original and varied operas. It’s one of his rare “comic” works, containing a great deal of facetiousness and humour whilst still being grounded in reality.This version was recorded live in 2019 across two evenings at the Teatro Romollo Valli de Reggio Emilia. Ottavio Dantone favoured mainly Baroque Italian voices without resorting to falsettists who, in his opinion, are too often used to replace the castrati of the past. The tendency to use countertenors for every purpose seems to be declining in favour of offering a better historical perspective. As such, Ottavio Dantone gave the main role of Serse to Arianna Vendittelli and her beautiful soprano voice, whose tone really captures the character’s fragility.Under the direction of its conductor, the Accademia Bizantina perfectly reflects the varied colours of this well-known work thanks to their clear attacks which beautifully emphasize the score’s many bravura arias. As for the young cast assembled for the occasion, they’re simply perfect. Monica Piccini excels in the role of Monica whilst the bright, clear voice of Francesca Aspromonte is perfect for the role of Atlanta. Alto Delphine Galou shines as Amaster, and the hilarious Elviro is flawlessly interpreted by Biagio Pizzuti. © François Hudry/Qobuz

Laura Pausini, a multilingual Italian pop singer who won a Latin Grammy in 2005 for Best Female Pop Vocal Album, decided to record an album of cover songs when she returned to the studio to record her followup effort. This is a fairly standard practice for pop/rock artists, of course, especially in the wake of a mammoth success like the one Pausini experienced with Resta in Ascolto (released concurrently in Spanish as Escucha in the U.S.). Io Canto (likewise released concurrently in Spanish, as Yo Canto) is a somewhat unusual covers album, however, for it's comprised of Italian pop/rock songs from the 1970s, '80s, and '90s -- few, if any, of which will be familiar to listeners across the Atlantic. Pausini performs the songs in a manner similar to that of Resta in Ascolto: the songs are heavily produced, layered with guitar, bass, and drums in addition to strings and synthesizers, and the performances are quite dramatic, often soaring to intense heights during the choruses, complemented by lyrics that are moody and poetic. Consequently, anyone who enjoyed Resta in Ascolto will find much to savor on Io Canto, as the two albums sound similar musically. The difference is in the songwriting, which is wonderfully varied, in terms of lyrics as well as arrangements, resulting in one of the most interesting albums of Pausini's career to date. Io Canto is interesting not only because of the array of songwriting showcased throughout, but also because of how personal these songs are to Pausini. She expresses this herself in her liner notes: "Recording an album of covers, and therefore having to choose among the songs which have been with me, are with me, and will be with me every day of my life, was no easy task. It would take ten albums like this one just to be able to touch on the essence of all the music I love. Decisions had to be made. And decisions were made. And so here is the music I listen to when I'm at my saddest, or when I feel a moment is special, the songs I used to sing as a young girl when I first started performing, and above all those which taught me to love music, and how music can move you so deeply, regardless of its genre or style." A lot of the songs on Io Canto are indeed deeply moving, beginning with the surging title track, which opens the album powerfully, as if sung from a mountaintop with arms outstretched. And so begins the second dazzling album in a row by Pausini, who seems to have found a comfortable place for herself musically in the wake of the indifference shown to her English-language crossover bid in 2002. That disappointing album's title was From the Inside, but this album feels ten times more heartfelt, as these covers reveal aspects of Pausini's personality generally eclipsed by the towering melodrama of the usual material bestowed upon an international mega-star of her stature.© Jason Birchmeier /TiVo

Laura Pausini's historic performance at Stadio San Siro in Milan, Italy, on June 2, 2007, was filmed for official release later in the year as San Siro 2007. Her second in-concert release in two years, preceded by Live in Paris 05 (2005), the CD/DVD is jam-packed with songs from throughout her career. While the two-hour-plus DVD includes 22 different tracks, six of these are medleys, adding up to 36 songs overall. (The audio-only version of the concert is shorter, jamming 27 songs onto a 80-minute CD.) The concert performance showcases Pausini's two most recent albums, Resta in Ascolto (2004) and Io Canto (2006), and includes a few surprises, most notably a multilingual medley of "Vivimi," a medley of "Y Mi Banda Toca el Rock," and Madonna's "La Isla Bonita," and a duet with Tiziano Ferro on "Non Me Lo So Spiegare." While the half-dozen medleys keep the show moving along at a brisk pace and help her jam as many of her hits into the set list as possible, it's sometimes frustrating to hear one of your favorite songs truncated for the sake of expediency. The same goes for her linguistic acrobatics. As impressive as it is to hear her switch between languages at ease during "Vivimi," it's frustrating to hear one of her all-time best songs adulterated. Moreover, the video cuts nauseatingly from shot to shot every 15 seconds, never focusing on any particular image (say, the featured singer!) for more than a fleeting moment -- from a bird's-eye view of the stadium, to the fans, to a long shot of the stage, to a close-up of Pausini, to a panoramic view of the band, to another long shot of the stadium that emphasizes the ongoing rainstorm, and so on. Then again, the storm does inject a complicating variable into the performance that can't be appreciated in the audio-only version, as Pausini and her band carry on with their open-air stadium performance in spite of the steady rainfall (whereas many of the fans are armed with umbrellas). Despite some of these frustrations, there's plenty to enjoy on San Siro 2007, above all the performance of Pausini herself, who rises to the occasion and seems unconcerned with the rain, never losing her composure, even as she races through medley after medley. Relative to her other in-concert releases, which include the aforementioned CD/DVD Live in Paris 05 (a more intimate performance indoors from the Resta in Ascolto tour) as well as the DVD-only Live 2001-2002 World Tour (2003), San Siro 2007 is her least essential. Yet devoted fans will want it nonetheless, not only because of the career-spanning performance but also because of the excellent sound quality and because of its historic nature. Pausini was the first female solo artist to perform a sold-out concert at the world-famous soccer stadium, drawing over 70,000 fans for one memorable night.© Jason Birchmeier /TiVo