Rameau: La Guirlande/Zephire. (Opera And Oratorio).(Review)

[] Daneman; Agnew, Bazola (Guirlande). Mechaly, Ockenden, Decaudaveine (Zephire). Choeur des Arts Florissants, Cappella Coloniensis of the WDR, Christie. Texts and translations. Erato 8573-85774-2

Breathing no less rarefied air than the Wagnerian heldentenor is the French haute-contre, a flexible tenor voice thriving in the upper atmosphere and able to execute effectively and expressively the necessary decorations to the lines of seventeenth-and eighteenth-century music. There are only a handful of these guys around, and you don't need to know the difference between a pince renverse and a tour de gosier to hear that Paul Agnew has mastered the art. He stars in La Guirlande, the first of two one-act opera-ballets by Rameau with William Christie conducting the Cappella Coloniensis (not his regular group, but one with whom he has collaborated on operas by Hasse and Mehul, among others).

The plot involves an unfaithful shepherd whose flower garland, symbol of his fidelity, has withered embarrassingly. He prays to Venus for its reinvigoration, hoping that his shepherdess will never uncover his guilt, but she has overheard the whole pathetic scene, and as an "innocent detour," she secretly replaces the shriveled flowers with her own intact garland. Assuming that ...