Dallapiccola’s drama is sure to leave you captivated
Misha Donat is gripped by this new recording of the composer’s complex one-act opera, The Prisoner
Dallapiccola
Il prigioniero; Prima Serie Dei Cori di Michelangelo Buonarroti il Giovane
Anna Maria Chiuri, Michael Nagy, Stephan Rügamer, Adam Riis, Steffen Bruun; Danish National Concert Choir; Danish National Symphony Orchestra/ Gianandrea Noseda Chandos CHSA 5276 (CD/SACD) 55:46 mins Dallapiccola began work on Il prigioniero (The Prisoner) in 1943, when he and his Jewish wife were hiding out in the hills outside their home town of Florence. This oneact opera, with its subject of the suppression of liberty, was clearly written out of deep personal conviction. Dallapiccola’s own libretto was partly based on a story by the 19th-century French symbolist writer Villiers de l’isle-adam called ‘Torture by Hope’, in which a prisoner, having suffered every kind of torment, is falsely led to believe he can escape – only to realise that he has been ruthlessly subjected to the most terrible of all tortures: hope. This is an opera that makes an overwhelmingly powerful impression: even the construction of the music itself forms part of the drama, with its complex pattern of 12-note rows symbolising the labyrinth of subterranean passageways through which the prisoner stumbles.
Gianandrea Noseda and his Danish forces offer a thrilling account of this masterpiece, its all-important orchestral detail meticulously realised. As the prisoner, Michael Nagy is alive to every nuance of the role. Stephan Rügamer’s caressing voice is ideal for the falsely sympathetic jailer, too. If Anna Maria Chiuri doesn’t quite have the warmth Phyllis Bryn-julson brought to the part on Esa-pekka Salonen’s fine Sony recording, she brings admirable dramatic intensity.
While Salonen’s disc (now out of circulation) included Dallapiccola’s Canti di Prigionia, one of which is quoted in the opera’s last scene, Noseda opts for two of the composer’s unclouded early a cappella choral pieces as a welcome contrast. A thrilling disc, splendidly recorded.
PERFORMANCE ★★★★★
RECORDING ★★★★★
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Gianandrea Noseda and his Danish forces offer a thrilling account