Dardanus on CD
by Peter Grahame Woolf

Universal Classics has a mid-price offer for some of its opera recordings on CD & DVD until March, many of them highly recommendable. Rameau has never been a top favourite in England, and this Dardanus was received for review shortly after enjoying a remarkable presentation by William Christie, touring with his Les Arts Florissants and a group of young singers Le Jardin des Voix, who gave excerpts from Rameau & Lully operas in concert performance with all the dramatic force of theatre, albeit without the trimmings of scenery and costume; they used the whole platform of London's Queen Elizabeth Hall, wending their way around the orchestra, managing to terrify us as they were tossed around the stage in a dreadful Rameau storm at sea, a virtuoso piece of choreography. This imaginative approach was controversial but for me it made for a highly successful, joyous event and a notable exemplar of how Baroque opera can be brought fully alive outside the theatre.

Headed by John Mark Ainsley in the title role, with mainly French singers in the large cast, and given here substantially in its 1739 first version, superior musically to a drastic later revision, this CD offers a superb realisation of one of Rameau's finest though lesser known operas. It is a tale of tug-of-war between rival lovers (Ainsley and Laurent Naouri) for Iphise (Veronique Gens), overseen by Venus (Mireille Delunsch). None of the singing can be faulted and it is a fine achievement by a company of musicians used to working together.

The music moves naturally from arioso to set arias and choruses, all with the felicitous orchestration for which Rameau is justly celebrated. An astonishing prison scene is heightened by dissonant, chromatic harmonies and an extraordinary bassoon obbligato. There are two splendid ceremonies, one a pledge of allegiance, the other a demonstration of magic powers, with sophisticated build up of tension and excitement, and integrated into the development of the plot by their sequences of ariettes, choruses and dances.

The period music orchestral playing is ever alert, lively or soothing and dreamy as required, masterminded by a specialist conductor, whose spectacularly successful Platée has been revived in Paris recently. Dance being an essential component of 18 C French opera, Dardanus has some thirty ballet movements, culminating in a final Chaconne which rounds it all off with a fine display of Rameau's resourceful orchestration. All these Universal Classics boxes are with full texts and translations, and this remains one of the best Rameau recordings available.

© Peter Grahame Woolf 2003.

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