H. Purcell Purcell - King Arthur / Gens, McFadden, Piau, S. Waters, J. Best, Padmore, Paton, Salomaa, Les Arts Florissants, Christie

The Fairy Queen may be the most famous of Purcell's "semi-operas" (spoken dramas with extended musical items incorporated--not to say dropped in), but King Arthur, with text by John Dryden, is undoubtedly the most satisfying. Not only is the music captivating on its own terms, it's unusually well-integrated into the action--for example, one musical scene depicts the heathen Saxons performing a pre- battle ceremony; another shows good spirits guiding King Arthur and his men through a dark swamp while evil spirits try to mislead them. The first three acts have a lot of vivid battle and pastoral music, but the real goodies come on the second disc: the first duet of Act IV, in which seductive sirens Sandrine Piau and Claron McFadden attempt to lure Arthur into a stream ("come, come naked in, for we are so..."), and the masque in Act V in honor of Britannia, which includes (in addition to winning music) a Chamber-of-Commerce-like paean to British products such as fish, wool, and wheat, a rowdy drinking song with some pointed anticlerical sentiment, and the famous song "Fairest isle" (beguilingly sung by Véronique Gens). The multinational cast handles the English text well; other standouts include the marvelous tenor Mark Padmore and bass Petteri Salomaa. This recording was prepared right after Graham Vick's wildly successful production of the full Dryden/Purcell text at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris (the booklet has some impressive photos); not surprisingly, the performances have an extroverted theatrical energy usually missing from concert versions of this music. --Matthew Westphal