Handel’s Solomon from Paul McCreesh & Gabrieli with Tim Mead as Solomon in Interior Temple Corridor

Interior Temple Corridor in its trendy incarnation constructed within the Nineteen Fifties

Handel: Solomon; Tim Mead, Rowan Pierce, Hilary Cronin, Frances Gregory, Anna Dennis, James Approach, Morgan Pearse, Gabrieli Consort & Gamers, Paul McCreesh; Temple Music Basis at Interior Temple Corridor
Reviewed 16 January 2025

Certainly one of Handel’s most interesting oratorios in nearly good circumstances, wonderful choral singing, effective orchestral taking part in, excellent dramatic pacing and 7 soloists who drew you into the drama. Pure magic.

Written in 1749, Handel’s Solomon is a lavish work, giant in scale, utilizing a double refrain and with the one of many largest orchestras Handel would write for (strings, flutes, oboes, bassoons, horns, trumpets, timpani), but Susanna which premiered the identical season makes use of comparatively compact forces. Clearly, in Solomon Handel wished the conception to match his eulogy of Georgian England.

After having written an entire sequence of martial oratorios within the years after the 1745 riot, Handel turned to a higher number of sources for his oratorios, Susanna and Solomon are each Biblical, however the one has parts of a lighter operatic fashion, while the opposite has that giant scale grandeur. Then in 1750 he would flip to a sentimental novel for Theodora, which although non secular in nature shouldn’t be Biblical in any respect, earlier than the ultimate towering masterpiece of Jephtha with its story combining the Bible with Euripides and the daring use of a dramatic tenor because the hero.

For Solomon, Handel gave the impression to be trying again. There may be the usage of Da Capo arias, but in addition the casting of the title function. This was written for a feminine alto, Caterina Galli, as if Handel was trying again in direction of the castratos of his Italian opera. Countertenors in Handel’s day not often had the dramatic vary wanted for the function, although these days Solomon isn’t performed by a lady. Having additionally sung Joachim in Susanna, Caterina Galli would create a sequence of exceptional roles for Handel together with Irene in Theodora and Storgé in Jephtha. In Handel’s performances of Solomon the three soprano roles, Solomon’s Queen, First Harlot and Queen of Sheba, have been sung by the identical singer although trendy apply tends to have them sung by totally different singers.

On Thursday 16 January 2025, Temple Music opened their 2025 season with considered one of their largest occasions but, Handel’s Solomon carried out in Interior Temple Corridor by Gabrieli Consort & Gamers, conductor Paul McCreesh, with Tim Mead as Solomon, Rowan Pierce as Solomon’s Queen, Hilary Cronin and Frances Gregory because the Harlots and Anna Dennis because the Queen of Sheba, plus James Approach as Zadok and Morgan Pearse as a Levite.

The live performance came about in Interior Temple Corridor, this can be a conventional classical fashion constructing courting from the Nineteen Fifties, and the third incarnation of the corridor. The unique seventeenth century corridor was exchange within the later nineteenth century by a Gothic one, this in flip was destroyed in the course of the battle and changed by the current one.

A really full stage featured a choir of 30 and an orchestra utilizing 22 strings and 6 oboes. The outcomes introduced a way of intimacy to a piece usually given in large environment (we final heard it on the BBC Proms in 2022 on the Royal Albert Corridor, see my overview), but the massive moments have been very large certainly. Paul McCreesh additionally gave us a lavish model of the work, with few cuts. Solomon is an expansive piece, with arias for the tenor and bass soloists (right here James Approach and Morgan Pearse) which are musically fascinating however not essentially dramatically compelling. Nevertheless, Solomon is a type of works that profit from permitting it to be expansive, letting us recognize its richness.

Solomon is the one character whom we see in a number of dimensions and Tim Mead didn’t disappoint. Singing with nice fantastic thing about tone but an admirable firmness of line, in Half One he was sturdy but considerate with a vivid urgency in his scene with Rowan Pierce’s Queen. In Half Two, Mead’s firmness of goal continued as he gave an admirable sense of judgement. Then in Half Three he moved from the partaking invocation to music to the extra statesman like in his dealings with Anna Dennis’ Queen of Sheba.

Rowan Pierce’s Queen moved from perky pleasure via fantastic thing about tone to a touching account of her last aria. At each level she made the phrases matter, in order that the scene with Tim Mead’s Solomon actually crackled in all the precise methods.

Hilary Cronin and Frances Gregory made two extremely contrasting harlots, in order that the trio with Tim Mead’s Solomon was stuffed with twists of character. While Frances Gregory made essentially the most of her extremely characterful function as Second Harlot, it was Cronin’s finely transferring First Harlot who stayed within the reminiscence, with an engagingly uplifting duet with Mead’s Solomon, and she or he acquired to finish this half along with her engagingly pastoral last aria.

From her opening recitative, Anna Dennis appeared and sounded each within the Queen (I’m reliably knowledgeable that her frock was Issey Miyake). Even when in repose, Dennis projected character, her first air was splendidly pressing, her second with fabulous oboe taking part in was masterly, ending with the wonderful duet with Mead’s Solomon.

The priest, Zadok has a job which is basically non-dramatic, he merely feedback. However James Approach made every of Zadok’s arias rely, so the in Half One his vibrantly compelling recitative led to an aria taken at a exceptional pace with the passagework being extremely descriptive. He introduced a pleasant swagger to his second aria, in Half Two after the judgement scene, and Approach made the aria work when it could possibly simply appear that Zadok is a prosy bore, saying the plain. He completed in effective fashion with a stunning account if his aria in Half Three.

The Levite has an analogous function, and it says rather a lot for Morgan Pearse’s mixture of method and character, that he made every of his arias into one thing vividly compelling.

The refrain was in terrific kind, relishing the double choir work that Handel gave them but in addition handing over moments of nice magnificence. That is undoubtedly considered one of Handel’s choral oratorios, though the soloists have a major contribution, and the Gabrieli’s 30 singers not solely gave wonderful worth however appeared to take pleasure in themselves too. The large choruses, the place the 2 halves hearth at one another have been terrific, with the addition of horns, trumpets and drums creating an excellent, however refined noise.

The orchestra made its personal contribution. The well-known quantity would possibly certainly be the sinfonia that opens Half Three, taken at fairly a lick by McCreesh, however right here and elsewhere the orchestra introduced admirable spring and bounce to the rhythms, together with lyricism when wanted. Solo moments have been effective certainly, from the 2 flutes to occasional oboes and, most memorably, the moments when Handel lets the bassoon off the leash. Superb.

This was a efficiency that actually drew you in. The singers’ diction was all high notch, not solely may we perceive the phrases (which is saying rather a lot when there are three soprano soloists) however the phrases meant one thing. This actually was oratorio as sacred drama, and every singer was projecting character. Sure, the judgement scene is pure visible drama, however elsewhere we had that too. You all the time sensed Tim Mead’s really feel for his character, while Rowan Pierce made a delightfully poised Queen and Anna Dennis projected a compelling regal sense always.

The house was simply the precise measurement, in order that the louder passages flourished however the quieter ones had a stunning intimacy. This was an enormous occasion for Temple Music, and a powerful success. While a Handel oratorio collection is an enormous ask, it could be good to listen to one other one.