Marie Théoleyre / Rémy Brès-Feuillet / Ensemble La Palatine

Presented by Philippe Maillard Productions (L-2-R-22-123841/3-22-12385). Marie Théoleyre, sopranoRémy Brès-Feuillet, altoEnsemble La PalatineGuillaume Haldenwang, harpsichordNoémie Lenhof, viola da gambaManon Papasergio, harp & viol Claudio MonteverdiLe Couronnement de Poppée (excerpts)Francesco CavalliLa Calisto (excerpts)Luigi RossiOrfeo (excerpts) With L’Orfeo in 1607, Claudio Monteverdi established himself as the genius who gave opera, then in its infancy, its noble status and its full human dimension. Nearly four decades later, L’Incoronazione di Poppea (1642) opened the doors of Venetian opera with all its excess and irresistible melodic seduction (the music written for Poppea and Nerone displays a suffocating sensuality). His disciple, Francesco Cavalli, further heightened this prodigious richness with an incomparable art, of which La Calisto (1651) remains the best-known example. But the Serenissima was not alone in being intoxicated by these luscious sounds: at the request of Cardinal Mazarin, the Roman Luigi Rossi created in Paris in 1647 an Orfeo that belongs to this direct lineage and proved to be an authentic masterpiece. Centered around the recurring thread of duets between Poppea and Nerone, the superb voices of Marie Théoleyre and Rémy Brès-Feuillet unite to celebrate this splendid repertoire, supported by the virtuosos of the ensemble La Palatine guided by harpsichordist Guillaume Haldenwang.