Handel - Messiah / Schlick, Piau, Scholl, Padmore, Berg, Les Arts Florissants, Christie

Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
The great strength of William Christie's Messiah is his soloists: the two sopranos, Barbara Schlick and Sandrine Piau, are excellent--Schlick warmer and more engaging than usual, Piau downright spectacular in "Rejoice greatly"; reigning countertenor Andreas Scholl and sturdy bass Nathan Berg (whose vibrato could use some taming) do fine work; Mark Padmore is one of the best Handel tenors around. Christie conducts with his usual energy and elegance--but the weak point of this performance is another regular Christie feature: his soprano-heavy, vibrato-heavy chorus. In French Baroque music this isn't a serious problem, but Handel's melodies and countermelodies require a transparent choral sound--Christie's choir turns them to soup. Still, while this may not be a first-choice Messiah, Handel collectors should consider it for the solo singing alone. --Matthew Westphal

Tracks:

Messiah: Sinfonia
Messiah: Recitative (Tenor): Comfort Ye, My People
Messiah: Air (Tenor) : Every Valley
Messiah: Chorus: And The glory Of The Lord
Messiah: Recitative (Bass): Thus Saith The Lord
Messiah: Air (Alto): But Who May Abide
Messiah: Chorus: And He Shall Purify
Messiah: Recitative (Alto): Behold - Air & Chorus: O Thou
Messiah: Recitative & Air (Bass): For Behold - The People
Messiah: Chorus: For Unto Us A Child Is Born
Messiah: Pastoral Symphony (Pifa)
Messiah: Recitative (Treble):There Were Shepherds - And Lo, The Angel - And The Angel, Chorus: Glory To God
Messiah: Air (Soprano I): Rejoice Greatly
Messiah: Recitative & Air (Soprano I & Alto): Then Shall The Eyes - He Shall Feed His Flock
Messiah: Chorus: His Yoke Is Easy
Messiah: Chorus: Behold The Lamb Of God
Messiah: Air (Alto): He Was Despised
Messiah: Chorus: Surely He Hath Borne - All We Like Sheep

Tracks:

Messiah: Recitative (Tenor): All They That See - Chorus: He Trusted In God
Messiah: Recitative (Tenor): Thy Rebuke Hath - Air (Tenor): Behold And See
Messiah: Air (Soprano I): But Thou Didst Not Leave
Messiah: Chorus: Lift Up Your Heads
Messiah: Recitative (Tenor): Unto Which Of - Chorus: Let all the angels
Messiah: Air (Soprano II): Thou Art Gone Up On High
Messiah: Chorus: The Lord gave the word
Messiah: Air (Soprano I): How Beautiful Are The Feet
Messiah: Chorus: Their Sound Is Gone Out
Messiah: Air (Bass): Why Do The Nations
Messiah: Chorus: Let Us Break Their Bonds Asunder
Messiah: Recitative (Tenor): He That Dwelleth - Air (tenor): Thou Shall Break Them
Messiah: Chorus: Hallelujah!
Messiah: Air (Soprano I): I Know That My Redeemer
Messiah: Chorus: Since By Man Came Death
Messiah: Recitative (Bass): Behold, I Tell You - Air (Bass): The Trumpet Shall Sound
Messiah: Recitativo (Alto): Then Shall Be Brought - Duet (Alto & Tenor): O Death - Chorus: But Thanks Be
Messiah: Air (Soprano II): If God Be For Us
Messiah: Chorus: Worthy Is The Lamb That Was Slain
Messiah: Chorus: Amen

Amazon.com

The great strength of William Christie's Messiah is his soloists: the two sopranos, Barbara Schlick and Sandrine Piau, are excellent--Schlick warmer and more engaging than usual, Piau downright spectacular in "Rejoice greatly"; reigning countertenor Andreas Scholl and sturdy bass Nathan Berg (whose vibrato could use some taming) do fine work; Mark Padmore is one of the best Handel tenors around. Christie conducts with his usual energy and elegance--but the weak point of this performance is another regular Christie feature: his soprano-heavy, vibrato-heavy chorus. In French Baroque music this isn't a serious problem, but Handel's melodies and countermelodies require a transparent choral sound--Christie's choir turns them to soup. Still, while this may not be a first-choice Messiah, Handel collectors should consider it for the solo singing alone. --Matthew Westphal

Customer Reviews:

As good as it gets! First rate performance for the price........2006-12-15

This 'Messiah' by Georg Friedrich Haendel done by a 'continental ensemble rather than an English team is every bit as good, and maybe just a bit better than some of the Anglo efforts by Sir Colin Davis and others.

Compared to other Handel oratorios, this work is not only the home of the glorious Hallaleujh chorus. From front to back, virtually the entire work has superior choral arrangements, and Handel's choral works are easily his strongest suit.

And, the work is recorded by harmonia mundi, which seems to have a talent for superior recordings of sacred works.

a voice teacher and early music fan.......2006-06-06

Bravo Matthew Westphal!!!!William Christie's Messiah leaves me cold .Almost all of those wonderful choruses were overwhelmed by the HEAVY sound of the sopranos whose pitch was questionable and many times difficult to "call" because the vibrato covered up any clarity that might have come thru from the lower voices. The balance was poor and the whole thing lacked emotional power!! Now the soloists did save the day or at least made the recording worth the listening time. I liked the fact that Scholl sang all of the alto solos and very well too! My "pet peeve" is when the countertenor is only given 2 or 3 solos and a female alto does the rest. I don't think Handel had that in mind..Mark Padmore (tenor) is one of the finest tenors to come from the UK and he sings Handel marvelously!..If you haven't heard him in some of the Handel operas such as "Giustino" with Michael Chance you must remedy that situation immediately. There are so many "Messiahs" available; take your pick.

French Messiah.......2006-05-26

I never heard an awful HIP recording of the Messiah, they all are great.
The last decade or so numerous good performances of this masterpiece are put on record: McCreesh, Suzuki, Fasolis, Christophers, Minkowski (although controversial) etc.

There is one recording that is the reference performance for me: Trevor Pinnock on Archiv, a very good, solid, balanced English performance with moderate tempi and superb soloists.
None of the above mentioned records did I like better nor did it add something different (apart from faster tempi, better sound) to what I already loved about the Pinnock record.

Christie's Messiah sounds less English than any other performance I heard and maybe that's because I like his performance the best.

The choir is great, but not as impeccably clean, articulate and virtuoso like Gardiner's or McCreesh's singers, Christie's choir sounds more human with more vibrato now and then.

(In fact, when I think about it, I generally dislike English choirs...all the drama in music is interpreted one way: sing louder and with emphasized pronunciation
therefore I also like Christie's Theadora much better than McCreesh's)

Christie has an elegant way in directing, his orchestra is very subtle in coloring and dramatic effects.
The soloists are great.
I find Andreas Scholl often too sweet, especially in Herreweghe's second Mattheus Passion, but here it works and I love his singing on this record.
I definitely prefer his voice over that of Michael Chance in Pinnock's reading.

Barbara Schick doesn't have a beautiful voice per se, it is fragile, shaky - not stable and anything but powerful, but I love her voice very much, her singing is very emotional and especially on this recording.

Nathan Berg is very authoritative, although his voice isn't a bass, rather a baritone, but I like it very much.

Sandrine Piau and Mark Padmore are excellent too.
Padmore's "Comfort ye" is the best I ever heard.
His performance is way better than Howard Crook's on Pinnock's record.
Sandrine Piau is simply virtuoso, her "Thou art gone up on high" is marvelous.

Overall Christie is sharper and more involved than Pinnock.
Pinnock has a more traditional, "timeless" and maybe neutral approach, which I still like very much.
Christie is more exciting, but without disrupting the stately and broad character of this piece, like Minkowski does in his interesting but flawed reading.

The sound of the recording is good, but unfortunately not substantial enough, I would have liked the sound to be somewhat bigger and warmer...but big deal, the performance is outstanding!

Get it before it's out of print!.......2005-11-04

As the Sinfonia played I found myself in tears, that violins could play so magnificently. To me, Christie's great strength is his orchestral textures. And the just plain perfection of everyone. I agree that this is not the most exciting rendition I've ever heard (the most exciting I think I've ever heard was led by Jorge Michael Schwarz at Trinity Church in NYC a few years ago) but on recording, it may be. In my quest to find a great one, I've bought Pinnock, Parrott, Gardiner, and who knows what else - because I'm not listening to them anymore! (ok, I still love Gardiner) I disagree about the soloists - while I love Andreas Scholl's angelic purely melodic approach, I also love the others, who sound to me like they are speaking as they tell the story, with grounded emotions and personalities. In addition, the chorus sounds like a community of real people, talking about what's happening - I realize this is jarring when contrasted with the orchestra and Scholl, but it's also quite endearing, like being at mass and hearing the choir in a small church. I think maybe in the great cathedrals we're so distanced from the sound of the choirs, so these aspects of their sound get filtered out, a great loss, and we forget what people sound like.

A must have.......2003-09-01

After 10 years listening to old Messiah recordings with modern instruments, and missing arias and choruses, I got bored of it, until a friend recomended me this one. I reencounter this oratorio and found it more than excelent. The soloists are great; Sandrine Piau makes and excelent performance on the well known "rejoice greatly" aria even though the ornaments, she makes a great line in all her arias and Barbara Schlick does the same. Andreas Scholl makes an excelent use of the dynamics in each of his arias using different ornaments depending on the aria, and performs a gorgeous duet with Mark Padmore in the last part of this oratorio. Mark Padmore makes a magnificent work over the arias and recitatives coloring his voice for each part of the text. Nathan Berg does an incredible job in his arias with very clear articulation and musical line all the time, and you can see that in "why do the nations" and "the trumpet shall sound!". The orchestra and Chorus are great all the time making differences when they are accompanying one of the soloists or when they are the the soloist. Being on period pitch and instruments makes this a masterpiece. If you don't have a Messiah, buy it. If you have it already, buy this one, it is better than any other you could have.

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