Alfred Deller’s only complete recording of a Handel opera. First staged at the King’s Theatre in London in February 1732 and revived two years later, Sosarme was not heard again in full (if not entirely complete) until a BBC broadcast in January 1955, conducted by Anthony Lewis. Conductor and performers then made this recording a […]
Two rare L’Oiseau-Lyre recordings of French Baroque masterpieces, newly remastered and making their first appearance on CD. From the time of its foundation in 1932 by the Australian-born, Paris-adopted philanthropist Louise Hanson-Dyer, Editions de L’Oiseau-Lyre specialised in French early music as the name of the imprint implied. The company’s first complete scholarly edition a year […]
PhilomusicaSeveral Eloquence releases have celebrated the pellucid timbre and vivid characterisation of the British soprano’ Jennifer Vyvyan. ‘A treasury to treasure’ was the BBC Music Magazine’s verdict on ‘Songs of England’ (482 5045), a L’Oiseau Lyre recital from 1953. Four years later, she took part in the first complete recording of Purcell’s masque, ‘The Fairy […]
A pioneering Handel recording of the 1950s in a new digital remastering, released on Decca CD for the first time. The scholar and conductor, Anthony Lewis, was one of the early luminaries of the L’Oiseau Lyre label which became, over time, the early-music imprint of Decca. Drawing on his experience of conducting and staging Baroque […]
A pair of L’Oiseau-Lyre albums reissued together, making their first appearance on Decca CD. As a church musician in Salzburg, the young Mozart was required to turn out a regular diet of masses and settings of the Vespers and Litanies. Sung at afternoon services on feast days, the Litany was a favourite form of Catholic […]
A newly compiled anthology of Decca recordings on Eloquence, surveys the healthy state of Handel singing in England in the 1960s, before this music became the preserve of musicians and singers within the period-instrument movement. This generous (145-minute) collection is based around a pair of newly re-mastered recital albums made by the contralto, Bernadette Greevy […]
