“Ercole Sul Termondonte“ by Vivaldi

I listened to Vivaldi’s opera “Ercole Sul Termondonte “ (Hercules in Thermodon) conducted by Fabio Biondi and orchestrated by Europa Galante. They played high quality wonderful orchestration.

Vivaldi must have been very popular in commercial use. Because several of the harmonies in this opera sound so familiar to my ears as I’ve heard them growing up like from TV commercial or radio.

According to the production notes, this opera was not discovered as one complete piece. They were scattered mainly two different places with so many missing parts including sinfonias and recitatives. So they had to reconstruct them by recycling (as Vivaldi had done often) and making up with a lots of guess works.

It might be because of this, it never feels as whole. Instead, many original arias were there which were sung at the highest levels by some of the current top opera singers. These singers include my favorite singers like Rolando Villazon, Philippe Jaroussky and Patirizia Ciofi. I’ve also known and very fond of Diana Damaru and Topi Lehtipuu. The only singers I’d never heard before this opera were Vivica Genaux, Joyce DiDonato and Romina Basso. All of them sang so wonderfully at individual level. So it more felt like compilation album.

Rolando Villazon sang powerful Hercules. As a big fan of Rolando, there is always fear that his voice is not going to be there after 2 years of voice setback and very serious throat surgery (Julie Andrews’s voice never returned from the same surgery). So it’s always so nice and special to hear his brand new voice.

Previously he sang Monteverdi wonderfully but his Handel was little bit of disappointment, because I love them both. I think the song selections were just not suited for his voice. (He and Mozart don’t mix well either even though they both are each great lyrical composer and singer for his voice is too Mediterranean.). He sings amazingly if he chooses right songs.

In this opera, he sings Vivaldi impressively well. Their musical temperaments are so much alike. But I was so used to listen to him in heavy-handed classical Puccini and Verdi Style, so it just feels neat, weird and wonderful at the same time to hear him singing in the 18 th Century coloraturas Baroque style. I think he has good time singing Baroque but there is little bit of feel that he’s still not used to the singing style.

Topi Lehtipuu is wonderful tenor with higher register which suites for Baroque music. He sang in “Combattimento” where his voice and Rolando’s higher register voice have similar texture so their voices streamed well together. He also sang Mozart wonderfully. But in this opera, the register of the role he sang seemed little too low for his voice range. There is no wonder, because I found out that the role was originally written for contralto.

Philippe Jaroussky sang at his usual highest level.

I’m not going to imitate the story of this opera (the battle between Amazon female warriors and Greek soldiers), but because of these reasons above for male singers, I found myself enjoyed more with the female singers. The girls’ power is stronger in this production. I think they had the most artistic field day singing Vivaldi’s flashy tunes.

I started to watch other videos of Vivica Genaux after watching the promo video of this opera. She has amazingly beautiful mezzo-soprano voice with powerhouse lower register. But her voice is not heavy at all but has lighter, feel good and large-scale juicy texture of biting huge watermelon. But every video I watched, she sings like she is so pissed off. I think that’s why she got this Amazon queen role.

When I first listened to Diana Damaru was when she played Queen of Night in Mozart’s  “Magic Flute”. She looked very scary and she rocked the house down with her high-tech high notes. She sang one of the most amazing Queen of Night aria I’ve ever heard. After that, I saw her without all the make-up and costume and I was very surprised to see a younger, prettier and feminine-like person. She was not scary at all like her persona on the stage. It’s amazing to see what music and make-up can do.

I first listened to Patrizia Ciofi when she sang with Rolando Villazon & Topi Lehtipuu in “Conbatimmento”. She also hypnotically mesmerized me with her very beautiful soprano singing voice in Donizetti’s “La fille du Regiment” and “Don Pasquale”. In these operas, she sang in amazing Bel-cante style but in “Conbatimmneto”, she sang in perfect early Baroquean style. I also watched some portion of her Verdi’s “La Traviata” where she sang so wonderfully. Her soprano voice has amazing flexibility and such effortless smoothness. She’s also very funny comical actor.

So I disappointed that she sang only two arias in this production. According to the production notes, all the arias by her role were lost. So they borrowed two arias from elsewhere for her role. She sang them so wonderfully though. Personally I think she was more suited for Martesia role.

According to the production notes, Romina Basso is mezzo-soprano. But in this opera, she sounded more like contralto. She sang as one of the Greek soldiers who desperately falling in love with one of Amazon female warriors. He (she) is the most thoughtful, melancholic character in the opera like Faramondo in “Faramondo”, so she put so much deep moving emotions into her songs, which made me want to listen to her music more.

The biggest surprise in this opera for me was Joyce DiDonato who is mezzo-soprano from Kansas. Her voice is so pretty and I’m obsessed with her aria,  “Onde chiare che sussurrate”.

Here are my favorite arias in this opera.

Onde chiare che susurrate (Joyce DiDonato)

Bel piacer ch'è la vendetta (Vivica Genaux)

Amato ben (Joyce DiDonato)

Non fia della vittoria (Rolando Villazon)

Ti sento, sì ti sento (Romina Basso)

Occhio, che il sol rimira (Romina Basso)

Quella beltà (Philippe Jaroussky)

lo sembro appunto (Philippe Jaroussky)

Se libertà mi rendi (Patrizia Ciofi)

Caderò, ma sopra il vinto (Patrizia Ciofi)