Handel - Serse / Rasmussen, Piau, Bayrakdarian, Bardon, Hallenberg, Peirone, Lippi, Rousset, Les Talens Lyriques, Dresden Opera |  | Artists: Sandrine Piau, Paula Rasmussen, Isabel Bayrakdarian, Patricia Bardon, Christopher Rousset
Label: Euroarts
Category: DVD
List Price: $29.99
Buy New: $21.29
as of 3/19/2010 23:43 CDT details
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New (15) Used (5) from $18.99
Seller: classical_music_superstore
Rating:  10 reviews
Sales Rank: 66859
Format: AC-3, Classical, Color, Dolby, DTS Surround Sound, DVD, Subtitled, NTSC
Languages: English (Unknown), English (Subtitled), French (Subtitled), German (Subtitled), Italian (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled)
Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Region: 1
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Number Of Discs: 1
Running Time: 160 Minutes
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 7.1 x 5.4 x 0.6
MPN: 2053798
UPC: 880242537980
EAN: 0880242537980
ASIN: B000BK5388
Theatrical Release Date: 2000
Release Date: November 15, 2005
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Showing reviews 1-5 of 10
 Superb July 14, 2009
William R. Morrison
I love Baroque opera, and Handel in particular, but I've been burned by trashy modern productions--I have a DVD of Alcina that I can't watch--so I was hesitant to buy this--but I'm glad I did. It isn't period, or modern, exactly: it's set in a kind of neverland where the costumes don't matter, and there's no big political message here, thank goodness (don't get me started on my DVD of Theodora that's an allegory about Richard Nixon).
Here it's just glorious music and singing, and if the plot is too complicated to bother trying to follow, it doesn't matter, because it's all about Handel and about wonderful voices. Everyone is terrific. Very highly recommended.
As Flimsy as a Shakespeare Comedy... June 5, 2009
Giordano Bruno (Wherever I am, I am.)
5 out of 5 found this review helpful
... but all the wit goes into the music rather than the word play. Shakespeare and the sundry Italian librettists who wrote for Handel had the same roots in Italian Renaissance farces and commedia dell'arte. With the subtitles on the DVD, you'll suffer only moderate confusion, trying to keep the twists of the story straight, but it doesn't matter. Any sprightly acting or artful stagecraft is way secondary to the flow of glorious music, including some of Handel's finest arias and duets. In fact, the very first arioso by Serse is the famous "ombra mai fu", which you will find sung by everybody and her brother on YouTube, an excursion I heartily recommend.
In this performance, the role of Serse is sung superbly by soprano Paula Rasmussen, and her "ombra mai fu" is the most affectively perfect I've ever heard. Her acting in male drag is nearly as impressive; she's as narcissistic and willful a tyrant as the role requires. Arsamene, the tyrant's brother and rival in love, is a role of comical frustration and impotence, sung and acted ripely by Ann Hallenberg. The woman both brothers love is Romilda, sung richly by Isabel Bayrakdarian, but Imilda has a 'kid' sister, Atalanta, who is set on stealing Arsamene from her sister. Sandrine Piau, as Atalanta, fails to steal a lover but steals the show, acting with coy capricious vivacity and singing at a level few sopranos have ever reached. The smaller role of Amastre, sung by Patricia Bardon, is curious; Amastre is a woman, the rejected fiancée of Serse, disguised until the final scene as a man. All of these roles were presumably sung, in the opera's opening in London in 1738, by imported 'castrati' from Italy. In terms of audience, Serse was a dud at the time, and for Handel its failure to earn money put an end to his efforts at promoting opera in England. The opera was first revived in Germany in 1924, and it has been staged more often than any other Handel opera except Giulio Cesare. It's the treasure vein of music that has drawn such attention, but the various attempts to produce it have run into a constant problem: the five principal roles MUST be sung in their original high ranges! Transposition to tenor or bass simply doesn't work musically.
Of the leading countertenors singing opera today, only Philippe Jaroussky could plausibly sing the agitated coloratura required in the arias of Serse. Conductor Cristophe Rousset has chosen the only musical solution by casting women in all five roles, a decision made possible today by the development of "historical" vocal technique. Five more 'convincing' and beautiful voices than Rasmussen, Hallenberg, Piau, Bayrakdarian, and Bardon have never shared a stage, I'd wager, not in the 18th or the 20th/21st Centuries! In terms of sheer vocal artistry, this Serse is arguably the best performance of an 18th C opera on DVD. Don't let the quibbles of previous reviewers deter you; this is a MUST hear&see production.
 Wonderful, yes...but January 7, 2008
Robert Baksa (new york state)
3 out of 5 found this review helpful
This is a wonderful production, well sung, costumed and designed. However, I was surprised to find that it did not satisfy me as completely as the old English National Opera production. Rousset conducts an absolutely gorgeous group of early music performers in which many of the string players hold their bows in the manner often preferred by early music proponents. But the ENO production is almost half an hour longer which suggests that the Dresden performance has been cut...something that we don't expect in newer performances. Oddly, though we tend to think of earlier performances as stodgy and conservative, ENO's performance is marginally stranger than the new one.
The humor in the Dresden is more heavy handed than at ENO so that the older performance seems to sprint along in spite of its greater length.
Both casts have much to recommend them but for me the ENO cast seems more in control of their roles. Murray is hammier than Rasmussen but it is an asset in the role. In spite of occasional shrillness in her voice, Masterson always charms me and I prefer her to Bayrakdarian. Lesley Garrett is also charming and she but she has strong competition from Piau. Rigby's voice seems better suited to the cross dressing role than the Dresden mezzo for whom the role lies too low. The king's brother is sung by a countertenor with ENO and its a toss up if you prefer a mezzo in the role. I find HIM more effective than HER even though I don't really like the countertenor sound. The father of the two sisters is stronger with ENO as is the servant Elvino. The Dresden Elvino is too broadly comic and oafish.
I love Handel's music. He was a remarkable melodist and his harmonies, particularily in his operatic scores, are wonderfully flexible and chromatic. He was much more "modern" than we think of if we only know things like the Water Music and the Messiah. But his melodies are often subtle and elusive. In the da capo arias it would be wonderful to hear the opening tunes again. I feel that the current practice of embellishing the return has gone too far. The da capos are often so distorted as to be unrecognizable. This is more of a problem with Dresden than ENO and in many new performances it is becoming more of an annoyance than a delight. One can only speculate on whether the practice in the Baroque was applied as much as it is today.
The big problems with the ENO performance are that it lacks subtitles and it is in English translation. I do not mind this although some of the words are missed when the singers go to their higher registers. Human beings do not appear to have changed that much physically in the last few centuries so one wonders how much more understandable the lyrics would have been if the orchestras were tuning at a much lower pitch AND if the singers were not so pressured to develope volume to cope with larger concert venues and louder orchestras.
Of course the over riding problem with the ENO production is that it seems not to be currently available. As a stop gap, the Dresden show will certainly be acceptable.
Excellent Version of Xerxes September 25, 2007
Connor Newlon (WV, USA)
I have to agree with the other reviews, this was an interesting, well-crafted version of a fine Handel opera. One negative in this production is the feel of the set and costumes--very dark and cold. Perhaps this is a deliberate contrast to the warmth and passion of the music? For me it didn't work. However, the singing and acting overcame the stale, morbidity of the set. Another small negative is that Romilda, played by Isabel Bayrakdarian was, at times, a bit shaky in her voice and not completely convincing with her character. This is a small complaint considering Bayrakdarian did well enough and the rest of the cast is extraordinary, as other reviewers have noted. I found the overall production impressive. Would highly recommend it.
Superb performances September 18, 2007
Marcolorenzo (Italy)
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
Superb singing, acting, and conducting, a classic. It will be a long time before this production is exceeded on a musical level. The settings and the costumes make reference to the turn of the 19th century Turkish Ottoman empire. It works to an extent, although the gray and black tonalities have made the job of the costumer and set designer easier, they do not add anything to the musical work. And if the sets and costumes are from 19th century Turkey then Serse is not Serse (4th century B.C. Persian) and this is disturbing also. But there is grandeur (flags waving and triumphal entrance on baby elefant sculpture at the celebration of the battle victory scene)and elegance and interesting movement and certain stage conventions (love letters written on paper, etc. ) are made easier by setting the opera closer to our time.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 10
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