A rare Handel pastoral ode at Carnegie Hall

Dinis Sousa and Hilary Cronin

English Baroque Soloists, Monteverdi Choir, Dinis Sousa

Alexander Ashworth, Dinis Sousa, the English Baroque Soloists and Monteverdi Choir

By Edward Sava-Segal, 28 October 2023

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“limitless inventiveness in portraying the contrast between gaiety and pensiveness”

Reviewed at Carnegie Hall: Stern Auditorium, New York City on 26 October 2023

Handel, L'Allegro, il Penseroso, ed il Moderato, HWV 55

Samantha Clarke, Soprano

Hilary Cronin, Soprano

Alison Ponsford-Hill, Soprano

Bethany Horak-Hallett, Mezzo-soprano

Nick Pritchard, Tenor

Jonathan Hanley, Tenor

Alexander Ashworth, Baritone

Frederick Long, Bass

Rachel Beckett, Flute

Monteverdi Choir

English Baroque Soloists

Dinis Sousa, Conductor

Gardiner and the English Baroque Soloists roll back the centuries

Roy Westbrook, 13th January

Refined if sometimes raucous pleasures from Haydn and Mozart as the EBS continues its European tour.

****1

Semele crashes and burns, but Louise Alder soars up at Ally Pally

Mark Pullinger, 2nd May

Rising like a phoenix, the Alexandra Palace Theatre stages its first opera since its reopening after eighty years of slumber.

****1

Gardiner steps into his Ring of Cantatas in Leipzig

Stephen Pritchard, 8th June

A taste of the opening weekend in Leipzig’s marathon Bach Festival.

****1

A religious experience at Prague Spring

Frank Kuznik, 17th May

Sir John Eliot Gardiner and his Baroque specialists continue their crusade to bring Bach's church cantatas to the modern world.

****1

Evil triumphs beautifully in Monteverdi 450 Poppea

Ilana Walder-Biesanz, 29th July

The final opera in Sir John Eliot Gardiner's Monteverdi 450 trilogy features an excellent cast and inspires deep emotion.

****1

An emotional L'Orfeo for Monteverdi 450

Ilana Walder-Biesanz, 26th July

Sir John Eliot Gardiner's Monteverdi 450 trilogy began its Salzburg run with a tear-jerking concert performance of L'Orfeo.

*****

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Edward Sava-Segal

Edward has been living in New York for the last 25 years, one of the reasons being the extraordinarily rich cultural life in this city. He has studied piano and classical music in his early years. He switched later on to computer science and data architecture but he kept an unwavering interest in following the classical music phenomenon here in New York and in his travels. Edward occasionally reviews fine arts events for the most prestigious literary magazine in Romania, his home country.

A rare encounter with an exquisite Handel pastoral ode at Carnegie Hall