Handel

Armida abbandonata, HWV 105; Tra le fiamme, HWV 170; Figlio d’alte speranze, HWV 113; etc

Carolyn Sampson (soprano); The King’s Consort/robert King

Vivat VIVAT 117 75:08 mins

What truly distinguishes soprano Carolyn Sampson’s recordings are her programmes. Yes, her instrument is glorious and her readings exquisitely crafted,

but it’s her carefully selected and interconnected musical choices that truly set her apart. This new recording exemplifies Sampson’s rare sensibility, as both performer and intellectual.

The young ★andel, darling of Italy’s high-power patrons, poured into his cantatas of the first decade of the 18th century expressive means which he was encountering for the first time. Abandonment sharpened the drama: Armida whose lover has escaped, Daedalus whose son Icarus f lies too close to the sun, Agrippina whose own son Nero has ordered her execution – each suffers diverse passions due to abandonment. But unlike other cantata composers, ★andel communicates the individual nature of his subjects.

The sexiness of Armida, the silliness of Icarus, the shiftlessness of Agrippina are implicit in his score; Sampson’s performance, and that of the King’s Consort, makes them splendidly explicit.

As the sensuous Armida, Sampson almost drawls the word ‘crudele’ as continuo players weave obsessively around it. In

‘Tra le fiamma’, about Icarus and Daedalus, first Sampson and then the Consort top ★andel’s flighty variations with their own; it would be funny, except that in the next aria Sampson’s darkened vocal hues and the Consort’s jabbing sequences prefigure the fall of Icarus. As the murderous, desperate Agrippina, Sampson’s intensity is relentless, from the machine-like staccato of her furious recitative to the limpid line and luminous timbres of arias in which she surrenders to her fate. ★er extemporising isn’t quite as extravagant as that of other artists performing the same cantatas, but in Abbandonata Sampson plumbs fresh expressive depths. Berta Joncus PERFORMANCE ★★★★ RECORDING ★★★★★