Simon Standage, Collegium Musicum 90 - George Frideric Handel: Apollo e Daphne; Crudel tiranno Amor (1995)
EAC | FLAC | Image (Cue & Log) ~ 255 Mb | Total time: 58:07 | Scans included
Classical | Label: Chandos | # CHAN 0583 | Recorded: 1994
EAC | FLAC | Image (Cue & Log) ~ 255 Mb | Total time: 58:07 | Scans included
Classical | Label: Chandos | # CHAN 0583 | Recorded: 1994
Handel's Apollo e Dafne is a difficult work to put in context. Completed in Hanover in 1710 but possibly begun in Italy, its purpose isn't clear, while, as secular cantatas go, it's long (40 minutes) and ambitiously scored for two soloists and an orchestra of strings, oboes, flute, bassoon and continuo. But this isn't just a chunk of operatic experimentation: it sets its own, faster pace than the leisurely unfolding of a full-length Baroque stage-work, yet its simple Ovidian episode, in which Apollo's pursuit of the nymph Dafne results in her transformation into a tree, is drawn with all the subtlety and skill of the instinctive dramatic genius that Handel was.