Pinchgut Opera<\/strong>
City Recital Hall, November 30<\/strong>
Reviewed by PETER McCALLUM<\/strong>
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In this production of Handel\u2019s early opera Rinaldo<\/em>, Pinchgut Opera brings the 18th-century imagination vividly to life with outstanding young voices, genial humour and exquisite musical discernment.<\/p>\n
Countertenor Jake Arditti sings Rinaldo with a voice that combines rounded velvety smoothness, flashing colour and agility. As the story\u2019s impeccable young hero, his singing translated the character\u2019s intrepid fearlessness of deed into gracefully shaped lines and roulades of swashbuckling notes delivered with insouciant panache.<\/p>\n
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Alexandra Oomens began the famous Lascia ch\u2019io pianga with haunting quietness.<\/span>Credit: <\/span>Cassandra Hannagan<\/cite><\/p>\n He and soprano Alexandra Oomens, as his crush Almirena, are ideally matched in vocal tone. Their duet in Part 1 was a delight for its sensuous intermingling of lightness and intensity. In the opera\u2019s most well-known aria, Lascia ch\u2019io pianga<\/em>, in Part 2, Oomens began with haunting quietness, sustaining a pace of barely moving stillness through simplicity of line and transparent clarity of sound.<\/p>\n In more lively numbers she sang with bright tone, full of rich colour, and always with unerringly true pitch. Then there are the bad guys. Adrian Tamburini as Argante burst on stage in Scene 2 with a voice of barking ferocity and rough-hewn finish, but, in gentler moments, revealed a capacity to mould lines with dark polish.<\/p>\n As the Saracen sorceress Armida, Emma Pearson leapt out of hell, her usual stomping ground, with vivid drama and wild vocal swoops, her later arias revealing crimson tonal richness, setting her apart from Oomens\u2019 purity as the story\u2019s goody-two-shoes. Completing the quintet of principals was countertenor Randall Scotting as Almirena\u2019s father, Goffredo, combining imposing presence and gentle voice. His singing was unforced, the lines emerging with elegant care.<\/p>\n As sirens, Bonnie de la Hunty and Olivia Payne beckoned Rinaldo to ruin with fresh voice and insinuating gesture. Louisa Muller\u2019s direction interpreted the chivalric fantasy of the story with indulgent humour, preferring to focus on the characters\u2019 human vulnerability.<\/p>\n Simone Romaniuk\u2019s design, with lighting by Verity Hampson, created deceptive depth to the City Recital Hall\u2019s concert stage through doors that concealed mysteries and surprises, and, at one point, opening to gorgeous floral excess.<\/p>\n Conducting from the harpsichord, Erin Helyard paced the work with instinct both for tempo aptness and for the dramatic moment, allowing flexibility for the singers to create gracefully free but not over-elaborate ornamentation. In one of the Part 2 arias, he took in his stride a hugely virtuosic harpsichord concertante accompaniment with surging waves of notes flooding from the keyboard, while the aria above unfolded with thoughtful poise.<\/p>\n