Any performance presented by Pacific MusicWorks is worth a listen, being as musically fine and period-accurate a performance as you are likely to hear anywhere today. Their Handel was no exception.
Handel was in his very early 20s when he composed Apollo e Dafne, but already had at least three operas under his belt. Listening to Pacific MusicWorks’ one-night-only performance of the cantata Saturday night at Nordstrom Recital Hall, is to understand how deeply he understood already the value of joint theatrical presentation and musical representation to draw his audience into the meaning of the text—whether that be secular or religious. His cantata is an opera in miniature, with emotions as sharply delineated as you’d find in Puccini’s Tosca but in a fraction of the time.
Seattle is fortunate that Pacific MusicWorks founder Stephen Stubbs brought with him on his return here the wide knowledge garnered during his 30 years of early music performance and direction in Europe, and his equally wide acquaintance with top-caliber performers across both continents.
For Apollo, he fielded an orchestra of 16 Baroque musicians, some of whom came from our own local and prestigious early music performing coterie. Others came from further afield, including two remarkable oboists with prominent solo roles, Kathryn Montoya and Kristin Olson, the first named doubling on alto recorder.
Bass-baritone Douglas Williams sang Apollo, Amanda Forsythe was Dafne, and with facial expression and minimal gesture the two embodied their roles.
From the first, Williams as Apollo came across as an arrogant, self-satisfied guy on top of the world for killing Python. As he sees Dafne and pursues her, he gives no thought to her feelings at all — in short, he is chillingly like one of today’s predatory stalkers. Forsythe as Dafne on the other hand, is blissfully peaceful in her sylvan abode and in an aria stark in contrast to Apollo’s boasting, she sings a lilting aria accompanied by recorder and plucked strings. Peaceful, that is, until Apollo comes after her, when she turns into an outraged spitfire, unmoved in her decision to remain chaste.
Apollo pursues her, she flees, and when he catches up with her, she changes into a laurel bush, which the bewildered god finally accepts. All this is in the music, but also in the singers’ dramatic performance. Williams has studied acting, and his very stance betrayed his feelings despite his elegant suit and tie. Forsythe wore a grass-green dress with drapery and an exquisite ornate silver necklace, almost a breastplate, her long dark hair simply dressed with one long ringlet in front of her shoulder. Both are superb singers, at ease with Baroque style, which resulted in a captivating, exciting performance.
At the end of the program, Forsythe returned to sing a recently discovered Handel Gloria composed about the same time. This is equally dramatic, the emotions here being joyful somber, vigorous, gentle, or prayerful, and ending with a brilliant “Amen” which Forsythe accomplished with apparent ease, totally on pitch, every note clear and musical. This would be amazing played with fingers on a violin or oboe, even more so achieved through control of the singer’s diaphragm and larynx.
The audience had the chance to hear the excellent orchestra alone at the start, in the performance of a lively overture taken from Handel’s Rodrigo. This was explained by Stubbs as being a suitable introduction to Apollo since that has none, and this being in the same key with the same instrumentation. And before the Gloria, the orchestra played Handel‘s Concerto Grosso in B-flat major.
While Stubbs occasionally gave a beat from his lutenist’s chair, the group played almost entirely without formal direction, as it would have been in Handel’s time. They stayed absolutely together by ear, by watching each other, and by a sense of how the music should go — not to mention some lengthy rehearsals last week.
