Credits:

Genaux, Vivica / Zazzo, Lawrence / Lautte

Description:

When the boundary between man and woman disappears...Baroque opera is in full swing...two CDs of brilliant arias by the superb mezzo Geno and the beautiful countertenor Zazzo. During the Baroque period, it was a common occurrence in Italian opera for female roles to be performed by male castrato or female singers. Castrato singers initially sang female roles, but from the 1630s at the latest, they sang and performed soprano parts as men. Female singers sang both female and male roles. Such gender transgression in baroque opera is what the 2017 Handel Prize-winning superb coloratura mezzo Vivica Juneau, the beautiful countertenor Laurence Sasso, who is an imposing king, and the Lauten The theme of the new two-disc recording, Baroque Gender Stories, brought to you by the Lauten Company, led by Wolfgang Kaczner.Here, arias and duets from operas by Handel, Vivaldi, Hasse, Galuppi, Traetta, and Vergenzile, as well as instrumental music, abound, as Genaux and Zazzo move back and forth between genders in a brilliant vocal performance of baroque opera. The centerpiece is the opera "Siloe," starring the Prince of Persia, with works by not only Handel, the most famous, but also Galuppi, Wagenseil, Traetta, and Hasse, for a total of five composers. In Hasse's opera "Achille of Ciro," the hero Achille (Achilles) dresses as a woman to avoid participating in the Trojan War, and in the duet of Handel's "Serse," Genaux sings the role of the Persian king and Zazzo the role of Amastre, Serse's wife, making gender crossing over quite easy. The interesting thing about baroque opera is that it is so easy to cross gender borders. The splendid and rich singing of Jenod and Sazzo, the standard-bearers of baroque opera, is accompanied by the lively orchestra of the Lauten Company, led by Katchner. This is a fun-filled, dense 2-disc set that offers a taste of the ultimate charm and brilliance of the human voice. Sony Music