Chateau de Versailles Spectacles audio recordings are almost as elaborate as the offerings from Palazzetto Bru Zane. The new (2023) recording of Lully’s Alceste is no exception. There is a 168-page trilingual book containing the complete libretto as well as masses of musicological and historical information about the piece and the choices that were made in recording it. The sections about instrumentation are particularly enlightening.
The work, based on Euripides, premiered in 1674 and is considerably longer and more convoluted than the work of the same title by Gluck. In essence, it’s a love triangle. Alceste is set to marry Admète, king of Thessaly, but she’s also pursued by Alcide (better known as Herakles) and Licomède, king of Skyros. Licomède kidnaps Alceste but is pursued and defeated by Admète and Alcide though not before Admète is fatally wounded. The gods agree that, if someone will give up their life for the purpose, Admète can be spared. Only Alceste is willing to do so, so she dies.
Alcide, who is well connected (being the son of Zeus), gets permission to rescue her from Hades and agrees to do so if Admète will give her up to him. This is agreed and, after a remarkably civilized trip to Hades, Alcide returns with Alceste but realizes that insisting on the deal won’t make anyone happy and returns her to Admète to general rejoicing. There’s also a comic sub-plot guying marriage as the enemy of true love. Preceding the five acts this all takes, of course, there’s the obligatory allegorical prologue sucking up to Louis XIV.
So, it’s pretty conventional for the period, but it does have some rather good music, including lots of dances, marches, battle scenes and “effects” music. These sound rather splendid played by period band Les Épopées and their conductor Stéphane Fuget. There’s lots of swagger, the dances trip along nicely and there’s plenty of percussion and unvalved brass, making it all sound quite exciting.
There’s fine singing too. The principal trio is strongly cast with the fine French soprano Véronique Gens in the title role, the extremely stylish haut-contre Cyril Auvity as Admète and Canadian bass-baritone Nathan Berg as a bluff and occasionally over-the-top Alcide. I didn’t mind the (perhaps too) emphatic bits, as they seem quite consistent with the way Alcide/Herakles is usually portrayed in the baroque era.
The comic relief is provided by Camille Poul as Céphise, whose cheekiness and slightly darker colours contrast nicely with Gens, and Léo Vermot-Desroches and Geoffroy Buffière (who also doubles as Pluton) as her rival suitors: Lychas and Straton. Guilhem Worms comes off well as both the villainous Licomède and a rather jolly Charon. Cécile Achille, Juliette Mey and Claire Lefilliâtre sing well as assorted goddesses, nymphs and shades. Choruses are mostly rather brief interventions, but they are sung well by the Chœur de l’Opéra Royal.
The recording is clear and well balanced with the orchestral colours especially well captured, at least on the 96kHz/24 bit digital version I listened to. It’s also available as three physical CDs, MP3 or standard resolution digital.
All in all, this is a very satisfactory recording of a major Lully opera. It’s very stylish, very French and properly baroque.
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Formerly a management consultant and ehealth guru, John’s interests in the classical arts range from recitals to straight theatre via opera and other classical vocal genres. He is particularly interested in the intersection of Indigenous issues and the arts.
