Handel's Semele with Cecilia Bartoli

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Cecilia Bartoli
Handel: Semele
DVD: 00044007433232
Blu-Ray: 00044007433263
Available May 12, 2009
“Sung dazzlingly, ‘Myself I shall adore’ was one of many high points in Bartoli's stunning performance, her first operatic role in a language other than Italian…The wonderfully intimate Zurich Opera House allows every detail of her performance to be savoured.” – International Herald Tribune

Opera superstar Cecilia Bartoli offers her first operatic release on DVD in 12 years, and also her first opera in English. Recorded live at the Zurich Opera House in January, 2007, Bartoli stars as Semele (a role usually taken by a soprano) in Handel’s late opera, which features such well-known arias as “Endless pleasure, endless love”, “Myself I shall adore” and “Oh sleep, why dost though leave me?”. Robert Carsen’s stylish modern dress production hints at parallels with the problematic relationship between the late Princess Diana and the British Royal Family. Available in both standard DVD and hi-definition BluRay formats. In addition to Bartoli, the cast includes Liliana Nikiteanu, Birgit Remmert, Isabel Rey, Charles Workman and others with William Christie leading Orchestra La Scintilla in this first production of Semele on DVD.

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