Mayr: Saffo (complete opera)
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JOHANN SIMON MAYR
Mayr: Saffo (complete opera)
Markus Schäfer, Andrea Lauren Brown / Concerto de Bassus, Simon Mayr Choir, Chor der Bayerischen Staatsoper, Franz Hauk
[ Naxos / 2 CD ]
Release Date: Thursday 31 December 2015
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No one did more to combine in his operas the innovations of the Viennese classical composers, Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven, with the Italian ideal of bel canto than Johann Simon Mayr, the Bavarian composer who rose to fame in Italy. His opera Saffo, first performed in 1794, dates from his years in Venice. Not only was it his first opera but it was premièred at the Teatro La Fenice where it was enthusiastically received. It is full of surprising and striking elements, with a strong musical realisation of the text, supportive string and woodwind writing and vivid solo and choral effects. Set by the Rock of Leucas, from which unsuccessful lovers leap to their deaths, the opera deals with the poetess Sappho's unhappy love for Phaon, finally resolved in a happy ending.
"It's a well made, well behaved score, but with occasional touches of genuine originality, especially in the scoring...The title role gets the main share of the opera's big moments and Andrea Lauren Brown makes the most of them, though the performance under Franz Hauk is sometimes a bit too dutiful." (The Guardian, January 2016)
"What's not to like? I haven't enjoyed a first opera so much for a long time, nor felt so enlightened by the experience of listening to one. Saffo will be an essential acquisition for anyone who loves Mayr's music and, at Naxos prices, it should prove very attractive to anyone interested in the way opera developed in the crucial period after the French Revolution and Mozart's death," (Recording of the Month MusicWeb March 2016)
Tracks:
Saffo - Dramma per musica in due atti. Libretto by Antonio Simeone Sografi
