Going the operatic rounds at the moment is a concert performance of Handel’s 1720 opera Radamisto, carefully prepared by Harry Bicket with The English Concert and an astonishingly talented cast of six singers. Thanks to the Oxford Friends of Welsh National Opera, it was possible to travel to Birmingham in comfort by coach from the Water Eaton Park and Ride, where a fortunate group of about twenty assembled for a 4.30 departure. The performance ended at 10.20 and we were home on the stroke of midnight, in time for a celebratory nightcap of armagnac.
What made it so important to attend? It was a rare opportunity to hear this opera, reputed to contain some of the composer’s best music, and moreover to hear it directed from the keyboard by Harry Bicket in a live performance. This follows his conducting of Handel’s Rodelinda and Mozart’s La Clemenza di Tito, seen in live transmission from the New York Metropolitan. There the opera was experienced vicariously, lacking the thrill of live singers and orchestra. Here the players were live but there was not the visual element of a staged production. I cannot understand people who don’t find this unsatisfactory.
Radamisto was the second important opera Handel wrote to introduce Italian Opera to the English stage. The first was Rinaldo, in 1711. Still to come was the trilogy of great music dramas of 1724-25, Giulio Cesare in Egitto, Tamerlano and Rodelinda. Musically, Radamisto is a rich – almost over rich – succession of dramatic recitatives and movingly reflective arias, remarkable for complex rhythmic structures, striking orchestration and challenging coloratura. No sooner is one breath-taking aria complete before it is followed by another equally or even more spectacular. The tension is ratcheted up from beginning to end.
Radamisto, son of Farasmane, King of ‘Thrace’, is happily married to Zenobia. His sister Polissena is married to Tiridate, ruler of neighbouring ‘Armenia’, who however lusts after Zenobia. To accomplish his aim, Tiridate lays siege to Thrace, captures Farasmane and orders his henchman Tigrane, who fancies Polissena, to seek Zenobia out. Radamisto and Zenobia are captured but escape. In suicide attempts by Zenobia, the first aided by Radamisto, the second an attempted drowning, they become separated, but he reappears as his own servant to announce his ‘death’. Tigrane, beginning to be sickened by Tiridate’s brutality, warns Polissena of a possible revolt, but she proclaims her continuing love and fidelity to her husband. When all is revealed, Tiridate gives Zenobia the choice of marrying him or seeing Radamisto killed, but his followers revolt. On the point of execution himself, Tiridate repents and is forgiven. All ends as it started. Yes, the plot is weak and the ending contrived, even causing some titters from the audience, but this is more than redeemed by the quality of the music and, on this occasion, by the performance.
The opening scene is between Tigrane (Elizabeth Watts) in breeches and smart red jacket and Polissena (Brenda Rae), tall, in a long elegant white dress. They are joined by Tiridate (Luca Pisaroni). The opening is sensational on many counts: the quality and complexity of the musical sound, the singing and characterisation of the performers, but not least the depiction of a powerful woman completely under the control of a manipulative man. Tiridate pursues his own aims, private and public, at the expense of all else until Polissena finally takes revenge. One realises with a jolt that this has a strong resonance with a case making headlines today. Radamisto and Zenobia appear in the following scene. The former is sung by the countertenor David Daniels, the latter by Patricia Bardon. Both sing and perform brilliantly. In isolation one could not have hoped for better from him, but one cannot escape the feeling again that the countertenor voice is not the best substitute for the original castrato of Senesino. In this case a tenor rather than a mezzo would have fitted in better.
The orchestral sound was amazing in the perfect acoustic of the cavernous Town Hall, a space dominated by the magnificent organ in front of us. The aria accompaniments are startlingly original. One with complex tight syncopated rhythm could be profitably studied by any jazz player. Particularly exciting was the entry of trumpets and drums at the end of the first act, horns at the end of the second and both in the final ensemble of the opera. The applause for each singer became longer and longer as the evening progressed, ending with a near-standing ovation, which was well deserved.
An almost perfect operatic evening. Would that we could have seen it staged!