Giulio Cesare - Handel [DVD] [1994]

Richard Hickox conducts expertly the Australian opera orchestra, although I prefer period instruments in this piece. The title role is taken by the Australian countertenor Graham Pushee. David Daniels and Andreas Scholl have more beautiful voices, but Pushee is very impressive. He is an idiomatic Handel singer, with very good technique, and his coloratura is agile and smooth. The highlights of his performance are the hunting aria Va tacito e nascosto with horn obligato, the breathtaking second act aria Se in fiorito ameno prato with violin solo, and the third act big aria Aure, deh, per pieta.

Another Australian singer, Yvonne Kenny, does the role of Cleopatra. I love her velvety soprano. She is a skilled Baroque singer too and has great charm and captivating presence on stage. All the arias are done ravishingly, especially the second act aria V'adoro pupille (the decor here is wonderful, with the little orchestra on stage according to Handel's instructions). The famous third act aria Piangero is outstanding.

All other singers in the cast are good to very good, although Elizabeth Campbell in the role of Sextus has a "strange" accent.

I highly enjoyed watching this DVD. 3 and half hours went almost without notice. And what a great opera!

If only, however, the rest of the cast were up to the standards of the two principals. Andrew Dalton (Tolomeo) has a sweet sounding countertenor, but hardly the right amount of menace or effeminacy that the role demands. Stephen Bennet (Achillas) has an efficient bass baritone but not again the real amount of menace for a villainous Egyptian; Rosemary Gunn rather warbles as Pompey's widow Cornelia, and Elizabeth Campbell as Sesto has a lot to do to convince in the breeches role played in the original by an artist such as Durastanti.

The staging is merely a vehicle for the talents of Kenny and Pushee who both deliver committed if not flawless performances. Kenny is at times a delightfully coquettish Cleopatra particularly in her early scenes masquerading as Lydia, a servant girl. She delivers the set-piece arias such as 'Piangero' and 'Da tempeste' with elan, though her duet with Pushee at the end of Act 3 is a little sloppy. Pushee's countertenor may not be the sweetest around, but his is a chameleon voice capable of great subtlety and panache in equal measure. He delivers the bravura arias of Cesare with accuracy in the long coloratura runs, and heartfelt sincerity in the soliloquy for Pompey (alma del gran Pompeo) and dall'ondoso periglio just as he is washed up on the Egyptian shore after battling Tolomeo's men. His 'battle' with the lead violinist in Se in fiorito (Act 2) is wonderfully reminiscent of the apocryphal contest between the castrato Farinelli and the trumpeter.

The whole is complemented with atmospheric sets and some stylish choreography, and is delivered virtually complete in Italian with subtitles. As a whole this is a good performance and experience of baroque opera performed by a solid, if not outstanding, cast with clear purpose and direction.