Handel's Nightingale

 La Francesina, Handel's Nightingale, Sophie Junker (Aparte) 

Handel's nightingale was Elisabeth Duparc, the soprano for who he wrote a dozen parts in the oratorios of the second half of his career in London. Sophie Junker feels some kinship with her and delivers this sumptuous selection from some of those, among which are roles from not-so-well-known works.

Prophetic raptures swell my breast from Joseph and his Brethren is a flamboyant opener, immediately capturing our attention with acrobatic flights, Sophie being especially notable in the higher range.

She holds long notes gracefully and handles some immensely elaborate baroque ornamentation with panache. If Handel was German and adopted by England, he was more an Italian composer in style having served his apprenticeship in Italian opera. Thus, the Belgian Sophie performs in English and Italian, and convincingly. The number of notes involved, and the time taken, to embellish the word 'amor' in Nasconde l'usignol in alti rami il nido, would be of statistical interest but is better a luxury to be enjoyed for its own sake.

What passion cannot music raise and quell from the Ode to St. Cecilia's Day is a more languid piece and the album demonstrates that 'raise and quell' versatility in being equally enjoyable when exciting the passions or intellect, or pacifying them. As the notes point out, the composer and performer are interdependent and Handel, and his first and latest nightingales, owe much to each other in this great music. Handel's is a career of utterly joyous sounds but he is known to have been a bit choosy in who he employed to sing them. Singers like Elisabeth Duparc were sought out from rival companies or even brought in from Italy to London's competitive music industry. It is a sure thing that Sophie Junker would have been to his taste when many that he auditioned weren't.

Playful more than fiery, and relatively light voiced, Sophie wraps herself round these expansive and intricate lines and impresses more with each listening. It's not as if I haven't got quite a few discs in this genre but this is, of course, nothing like Nathalie Stutzmann and not quite like Carolyn Sampson either and all are welcome, not to say necessary and one can hardly have too many such.

But it's not all about Sophie because one soon notices the orchestra, Le Concert de l'Hostel Dieu, whose neat, beautifully captured sound, is made by few enough players but is worth the price on its own, preferably as accompaniment on such masterpieces as In sweetest harmony they lived from Saul that I don't think I was aware of before. Georg Frederick only has to show you more things very much like all his other stuff to amaze one all the more. There must be a trick to it, of course, but we don't want to let sunlight in on the magic. I would in theory prefer to have all the operas and oratorios lined up on the shelves but life is sadly finite and too short and so anthologies of highlights like this concentrate the mind.

I realize that the purely instrumental sinfonias included are by way of intermission and variety but, to be overly critical and very greedy, the two sinfonias and the Overture to Semele take up nearly 12  minutes that could have been given to a couple more vocal pieces. That's what one bought the album for.

The best tracks on this are gorgeous and sensational, and that is about half of them. I had recently taken a shine to disc XIX of Ton Koopman's complete Buxtehude but this disc will be with it at the top of the playlist for the next few weeks. Sophie and l'Hostel Dieu convince me that Handel is under-rated by his place in my elite Top 4 but what can you do when, sooner or later, I'll play Le Nozze di Figaro, Die Zauberflote, The Well-Tempered Klavier or the Cello Suites. But if this is the sort of thing you like, it's probably essential.