Monteverdi L'incoronazione di Poppea opera to a libretto by Giovanni Francesco Busenello. Directed by John Eliot Gardiner Elsa Rooke at the Teatro La Fenice in Venice. Stars Hana Blažíková (Poppea/Fortuna), Kangmin Justin Kim (Nerone), Marianna PIzzolato (Ottavia), Gianluca Buratto (Seneca), Carlo Vistoli (Ottone), Anna Dennis (Drusilla/Virtú/Pallade), and Lucile Richardot (Arnalta/Venere). John Eliot Gardiner conducts the English Baroque Soloists and the Monteverdi Choir. Lighting design by Rick Fisher; costume design by Patricia Hofstede and Isabella de Sabata. Sung in Italian. Released 2022, disc has 5.1 dts-HD Master Audio sound. Grade: D
The artwork on the front cover of this title is only slightly different from the artwork on the front cover of Gardiner’s recording of the Monteverdi Il Ritorno D’Uisse in Patria, which is from the same series of the 3 Monteverdi operas published by Opus Arte. It’s truly puzzling why Opus Arte would put such strange and potentially confusing artwork on these titles.
This is a “staged” concert verison of L'incoronazione di Poppea. It’s not an opera performance. We ran into somethings similar in 2021 with the three Mozart/Da Ponte operas in concert versions presented by Harnoncourt. Now in 2022 John Eliot Gardiner has published the three major operas of Monteverdi in the same way.
Concert versions of operas can be thrilling for opera experts. But they would be unsatisfactory if you want to see an actual opera. This website is aimed at folks just getting into the fabulous world of fine arts on HDVDs, so we only review real opera performances. We give a D to the staged concerts. This doesn’t mean the performance is bad. It just means “don’t buy this unless you have a special reason.” I can say that print critics love Gardiner and liked this show. So, if you would like to see a concert version of L’Orfeo, this production by Gardiner is probably about as good as it gets. Look at our alphalist and you will find multiple beautiful versions of the actual opera.
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