Handel: Duets Rosemary Joshua, Dame Sarah Connolly English Concert & Harry Bicket

• George Frideric Handel (1685 - 1759): Radamisto, HWV 12, Act III:
• 1Handel: Radamisto, HWV 12, Act III: Se teco vive il cor03:14
• Rodelinda, HWV 19, Act II:
• 2Handel: Rodelinda, HWV 19, Act II: Io t'abbraccio06:53
• Solomon, HWV 67, Part I:
• 3Handel: Solomon, HWV 67, Part I: Welcome as the dawn of day03:10
• Theodora, HWV 68, Act III:
• 4Handel: Theodora, HWV 68, Act III: Streams of pleasure ever flowing06:49
• Ottone, re di Germania, HWV 15, Act III:
• 5Handel: Ottone, re di Germania, HWV 15, Act III: Notte cara!04:36
• Theodora, HWV 68, Act II:
• 6Handel: Theodora, HWV 68, Act II: To thee, thou glorious son of worth04:55
• Ariodante, HWV 33, Act III:
• 7Handel: Ariodante, HWV 33, Act III: Bramo haver mille vite04:51
• Belshazzar, HWV 61, Act III:
• 8Handel: Belshazzar, HWV 61, Act III: Great victor, at your feet I bow04:58
• Tamerlano, HWV 18, Act III:
• 9Handel: Tamerlano, HWV 18, Act III: Vivo in te mio caro bene07:01
• Sosarme, re di Media, HWV 30, Act II:
• 10Handel: Sosarme, re di Media, HWV 30, Act II: Per le porte del tormento07:33
• Agrippina, HWV 6,, Act III:
• 11Handel: Agrippina, HWV 6,, Act III: No, no, ch'io non apprezzo03:53
• Giulio Cesare in Egitto, Act III:
• 12Handel: Giulio Cesare in Egitto, Act III: Caro! Bella!04:48
• Total Runtime01:02:41

Info for Handel: Duets

This Handel collection features two great Handelian singers, Sarah Connolly and Rosemary Joshua, accompanied by the English Concert conducted by Harry Bicket. The programme offers a carefully chosen selection from Handel Operas ‘Guilio Cesare’, ‘Belshazzar’, ‘Theodora’, ‘Ottone’, ‘Sosarme’, ‘Radamisto’, ‘Rodelinda’, ‘Agrippina’ and ‘Tamerlano’. Duets play a key role in Handel’s stage works; he understood the dramatic effectiveness of blending two voices together - generally those of a soprano heroine and castrato hero. Sarah Connolly is a highly sought after Artist who has performed a number of Handel roles on stage including Giulio Cesare for the Glyndebourne Festival. Rosemary Joshua has developed quite a reputation for her Handel roles, which include the title role in Semele on stage for which she was nominated for a Laurence Olivier Award and on disc for Chandos.

“Admired individually as expert Handelian singers, together they [Joshua and Connolly] are perfectly attuned to each other’s (and Handel’s) musical gestures. The constant dovetailing and matching required is immaculately done, the balancing of words and notes achieved with remarkable consistency. On this occasions when they land on the same notes, there’s not a hair’s breadth between them, and whatever mood is to be conveyed, they capture it perfectly and in expressive union. Harry Bicket and the English Concert provide neat and lightly peppy playing. I suspect this will become a classic Handel recording.” (George Hall, Opera)

“Joshua and Connolly are an ideal partnership in these Handel highlights.” (David Vickers, Gramophone Magazine)

“…The playing is crisp and the singing is polished and stylish, with Joshua, in particular, conveying infectious delight in this sophisticated music.” (Anna Picard, BBC Music Magazine)

Rosemary Joshua, soprano
Dame Sarah Connolly, mezzo-soprano
English Concert
Harry Bicket, director, harpsichord, organ

Rosemary Joshua
was born in Cardiff and studied at the Royal College of Music. She has appeared as Adele (Die Fledermaus) at The Metropolitan Opera, New York, the Vixen (The Cunning Little Vixen) and Tytania (A Midsummer Night’s Dream) at Teatro alla Scala, Milan, Anne Trulove (The Rake’s Progress) at The Royal Opera, Covent Garden, Théâtre royal de la Monnaie, Brussels, and Glyndebourne Festival Opera, Oscar (Un ballo in maschera) and the Vixen for De Nederlandse Opera, and Susanna (Le nozze di Figaro) at Glyndebourne Festival Opera, Bayerische Staatsoper, Munich, Welsh National Opera, and Oper Köln. She is especially highly regarded for her Handel roles, having sung Ginevra (Ariodante) in San Diego, Angelica (Orlando) in Munich, at Covent Garden, and the Aix-en-Provence Festival, Poppaea (Agrippina) in Cologne, Brussels and Paris, Cleopatra (Giulio Cesare) in Paris, Amsterdam and Florida, and the title role in Semele at the Aix-en-Provence and Innsbruck festivals, the Vlaamse Opera, Oper Köln, and the BBC Proms; her performance of the latter part at English National Opera earned her a Laurence Olivier Award nomination. Rosemary Joshua has also sung Nitocris (Belshazzar) at the Deutsche Staatsoper, Berlin, and at the Innsbruck and Aix-en-Provence festivals, and the title role in Partenope at English National Opera.

Dame Sarah Connolly
was made a DBE in the 2017 Birthday Honours, having previously been awarded a CBE in the 2010 New Year Honours. In 2020 she was made an Honorary Member of the Royal Philharmonic Society in recognition of her outstanding services to music.

She has sung at the Aldeburgh, Edinburgh, Lucerne, Salzburg and Tanglewood Festivals and the BBC Proms where, in 2009, she was a soloist at the Last Night. Opera engagements have taken her around the world from the Metropolitan Opera to the Royal Opera House, the Paris Opera, La Scala Milan, the Vienna and Munich State Operas and the Bayreuth, Glyndebourne and Aix-en-Provence Festivals.

In the 2021/22 season Dame Sarah returns to the Gran Teatro del Liceu in Barcelona for Geneviève Pelléas et Mélisande and to the Metropolitan Opera to reprise the role of Gertrude in the American premiere of Brett Dean’s Hamlet. She appears in concert with the CBSO, the Wiener Symphoniker and the Philharmonia Orchestra and gives recitals in Amsterdam, in Barcelona and at the Aldeburgh, Leeds and Oxford Lieder Festivals.

Harry Bicket
Internationally renowned as an opera and concert conductor of distinction, Harry Bicket is especially noted for his interpretation of baroque and classical repertoire and since 2007 has been Artistic Director of The English Concert, one of Europe’s finest period orchestras. In 2013, following regular guest appearances for Santa Fe Opera, he became their Chief Conductor and in 2018 assumed the Music Directorship. Since taking up his position, he has conducted Cosi fan tutte, Fidelio, La Finta Giardiniera, Romeo et Juliette, Alcina and Candide. In the 2019 season, he also performed Strauss’ Four Last Songs with Renée Fleming. Born in Liverpool, Harry studied at the Royal College of Music and the University of Oxford.

The English Concert tour of Rodelinda, planned for Spring 2020, fell victim to the severe disruption caused by Covid-19, though, remarkably, a studio recording was swiftly re-planned and made observing the current restrictions and is due for release later this season. The English Concert also revised its planning to include a series of small-scale, highly-successful live streamed concerts from historic venues in the London area. Guest engagements later this season will include Bergen National Opera (La clemenza di Tito). In summer 2021, Harry returns to Santa Fe Opera to lead productions of A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Le nozze di Figaro.

Booklet for Handel: Duets