Harnoncourt conducts Handel (incls 'Messiah' [excerpts] & Organ Concerto, op.4 no.3}

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HANDEL
Harnoncourt conducts Handel (incls 'Messiah' [excerpts] & Organ Concerto, op.4 no.3}
Lucia Popp, Paul Esswood, Roberta Alexander, Alice Harnoncourt, Herbert Tachezi / Concentus musicus Wien / Nikolaus Harnoncourt

[ Teldec Warner Classics / 2 CD ]

Release Date: Thursday 1 October 2009

Nikolaus Harnoncourt at Eighty - Harnoncourt & Handel

Once dubbed the high priest of "authenticity", dread word, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, cellist, early music specialist, author and conductor has long been both plausible and consistent in his denial of the accusation. "I would never use the word authenticity for my work", he says. "It can only be authentic 'me', not authentic Bach, Biber, Handel or Telemann. Old instruments produce the best sound for this repertory but they do not necessarily produce the sound of the period."

Nowadays, even the "early music" label can no longer be applied with undue emphasis to Harnoncourt, for he has become, over the past twenty-five years or so, as identifiable an interpreter of Classical, Romantic and twentieth-century music as he has remained in the Baroque sphere on which his reputation was established. Indeed, since his set of Beethoven symphonies for Teldec was named Record of the Year in the 1992 Gramophone Awards, Harnoncourt has performed and recorded all the Schubert symphonies (Teldec), as well as symphonies by Haydn, Mozart, Schumann, Brahms, Dvorák and Bruckner, and a wide range of vocal and choral music from the seventeenth to the twentieth centuries.

"For me the emotional responses in music are the most important. Authenticity and performing practice are always in danger of becoming dogmatic. Besides musical value, an opera must have a message as a wok of art which is not bound just to its own time. The drama must be so timeless in its depiction of human psychology that you can forget it is three hundred years old, or whatever. Monteverdi is such a composer, Handel another." Happy birthday, maestro, and many happy returns of the day!

Tracks:

Messiah, HWV 56 (excerpts)
Orchestra Concentus musicus Wien

Giulio Cesare, HWV 17 (excerpts)
Soloist Lucia Popp
Soloist Paul Esswood
Soloist Roberta Alexander
Chorus Arnold Schoenberg Chor
Orchestra Concentus musicus Wien

Concerto grosso in C major, HWV 318 (Concerto in Alexander's Feast): I Allegro
Soloist Alice Harnoncourt
Soloist Erich Hobarth
Orchestra Concentus musicus Wien

Alexander's Feast or The Power of Music, HWV 75: Part I No.13 Chorus: The many rend the skies with loud applause
Chorus Stockholm Bach Choir
Orchestra Concentus musicus Wien

Samson, HWV 57 Act III (conclusion)
Soloist Jochen Kowalski
Soloist Anton Scharinger
Soloist Maria Venuti
Chorus Arnold Schoenberg Chor
Orchestra Concentus musicus Wien

Concerto grosso, op.6 no.5 in D major, HWV 323
Soloist Anita Mitterer
Soloist Christoph Coin
Orchestra Concentus musicus Wien

Organ Concerto, op.4 no.3 in G minor, HWV 291
Soloist Herbert Tachezi
Orchestra Concentus musicus Wien

Saul, HWV 53 (excerpts)
Soloist Paul Esswood
Chorus Konzertvereinigung Wiener Staatsopernchor
Orchestra Concentus musicus Wien

Water Music - Suite in D major, HWV 349: Alla hornpipe
Orchestra Concentus musicus Wien

Ode for St Cecilia's Day (From Harmony, from heav'nly Harmony), HWV 76: No.3 Air: What passion cannot Music raise and quell!
Soloist Felicity Palmer
Orchestra Concentus musicus Wien

Theodora, HWV 68 (excerpts)
Soloist Jochen Kowalski
Chorus Arnold Schoenberg Chor
Orchestra Concentus musicus Wien

"Utrecht" Te Deum, HWV 278: Chorus: We praise thee, O God
Chorus Arnold Schoenberg Chor
Orchestra Concentus musicus Wien

Apollo e Dafne, HWV 122: No.9 Aria: Mie piante correte; mie braccia stringete l'ingrata beltà
Soloist Thomas Hampson
Orchestra Concentus musicus Wien

Belshazzar, HWV 61 (excerpts)
Soloist Paul Esswood
Chorus Stockholm Kammerchören
Orchestra Concentus musicus Wien

Concerto grosso, op.3 no.6 in D major, HWV 317
Orchestra Concentus musicus Wien

Jephtha, HWV 70 (excerpts)
Chorus Various
Orchestra Concentus musicus Wien