For anyone who still thinks of Antonio Vivaldi simply as the composer of The Four Seasons, it may come as a shock to learn not only that the manuscripts of over 450 of his other works are currently preserved in the archives of the National University Library in Turin but that since the year 2000 the independent French label Naïve has been embarked upon the Herculean task of issuing every single one of them on CD. Among the Turin library's collection are 15 operas (although Vivaldi is actually known to have composed at least 49), of which nine have so far been released by Naïve in brand-new studio recordings.Recorded live during 2001 stage performances at the Teatro de la Zarzuela in Madrid, this strikingly theatrical period-instrument version of what seems to have been the Red Priest's own favourite amongst his later operas was in fact first released in 2002 on the conductor Jordi Savall's own label, Alia Vox, but now makes a more than welcome return in the Vivaldi Edition's characteristically eye-catching livery (and still comfortably filling three CDs, though now shorn of the insert arias by the Spanish-based Italian composer Francesco Corselli that had been added for the opera's 1739 Madrid run and were perhaps over-enthusiastically included in the original Alia Vox release).
A typical 18th-century confection of conflicting personal and political loyalties played out among the dysfunctional ruling dynasties of a far-flung corner of the early Roman Empire, Farnace shares a couple of main characters with better-known operas from the Age of the Castratos: Farnace himself (sung with his familiar vocal bite by the ever vital Furio Zanasi) is the same Pontian Prince who pops up in Mozart's early opera Mitridate, rè di Ponto, though he has since both won and lost his father's throne; while Pompeo (sung with her usual commanding authority by the contralto Sonia Prina) is none other than poor old Pompey the Great, whose severed head is served up on a plate to Julius Caesar at the start of Handel's great opera. The other key players are Tamiri, Farnace's wife (the lustrous Sara Mingardo, equally impressive in combative and plaintive mode); Berenice, the Amazonian Queen of Cappadocia (ably sung if slightly under-characterised by Adriana Fernández), who is hellbent on destroying Farnace even at the cost of her kingdom's survival and her own daughter's life; and Selinda, Farnace's scheming sister (Gloria Banditelli), who attempts to help her brother out by seducing both Pompey's and Berenice's first lieutenants.
One of Vivaldi's richest and most varied, as well as genuinely dramatic, scores – with several fine choruses, a duet and even a quartet enhancing the customary stream of solo arias – Farnace is full of startlingly original effects: one aria, for example, features a sustained pedal note for two horns, another has only muted strings for accompaniment, while a third, "Gelido in ogni vena" (All my blood runs cold), underscores Farnace's fear that his wife might actually have followed his orders, and murdered their only son, with icy dissonances blown straight in from the "Winter" landscapes of The Four Seasons. With the singers indulging in authentic real-time improvisation of embellishments in the repeat sections of their da capo arias, and the recitatives moving with all the added urgency and pace of a live performance, this has to be one of the most impressively realised recordings of a Vivaldi opera yet released.
Hear tracks at www.vivaldiedition.com.
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