Ринальдо: Опера Генделя и три столетия на сцене

1711 opera by George Frideric Handel

Rinaldo (HWV 7) is an opera by George Frideric Handel, composed in 1711, and was the first Italian language opera written specifically for the London stage. The libretto was prepared by Giacomo Rossi from a scenario provided by Aaron Hill, and the work was first performed at the Queen's Theatre in London's Haymarket on 24 February 1711. The story of love, war and redemption, set at the time of the First Crusade, is loosely based on Torquato Tasso's epic poem Gerusalemme liberata ("Jerusalem Delivered"), and its staging involved many original and vivid effects. It was a great success with the public, despite negative reactions from literary critics hostile to the contemporary trend towards Italian entertainment in English theatres. Handel composed Rinaldo quickly, borrowing and adapting music from operas and other works that he had composed during a long stay in Italy in the years 1706–10, during which he established a considerable reputation. In the years following the premiere, he made numerous amendments to the score. Rinaldo is regarded by critics as one of Handel's greatest operas. Of its individual numbers, the soprano aria "Lascia ch'io pianga" has become a particular favourite, and is a popular concert piece. Handel went on to dominate opera in England for several decades. Rinaldo was revived in London regularly up to 1717, and in a revised version in 1731; of all Handel's operas, Rinaldo was the most frequently performed during his lifetime. After 1731, however, the opera was not staged for more than 200 years. Renewed interest in baroque opera during the 20th century led to the first modern professional production in Handel's birthplace, Halle, Germany, in 1954. The opera was mounted sporadically over the following thirty years; after a successful run at New York's Metropolitan Opera in 1984, performances and recordings of the work have become more frequent worldwide. Rinaldo was the first Handel opera to have found its way to the Metropolitan. The opera's tercentenary in 2011 brought a modernized production at the Glyndebourne Festival.

The amount of recycled music in Rinaldo is such that Dean and Knapp call it an "anthology" of the best works from Handel's Italian period. The sudden blast of trumpets which announces the march in act 3 provides, say Dean and Knapp, "an effect of splendour and exhilaration that time has not dimmed". The harpsichord solos which decorate "Vo' far guerra" in act 2 were originally improvised on the keyboard by Handel during performances, and were extremely popular. They were remembered and written down by William Babell, and published later as separate pieces. Lang believes that in spite of the borrowings, and the hasty manner in which the work was put together, Rinaldo is one of Handel's great operas.

The main musical numbers from the 1711 libretto are listed, together with changes and replacements from the two major revisions of 1717 and 1731. Minor changes, transpositions, and alterations to recitative sections are not shown. New numbers introduced in 1717 and 1731 are listed separately. Other arias not listed may have been sung in Rinaldo during the years 1711–17, but in the absence of contemporary evidence from scores or librettos the extent of such changes cannot be accurately ascertained. During the initial run at the Queen's Theatre the publisher John Walsh printed Songs in the Opera of Rinaldo, in mainly short score form. Apart from the overture, instrumental numbers were omitted, as were the recitatives. In June 1711 Walsh published a fuller version, which included instrumental parts; he continued to publish versions of individual numbers, with a variety of orchestrations, until the 1730s. In 1717 William Babell issued an arrangement for harpsichord of the overture and seven of the arias. Friedrich Chrysander published editions of the whole opera in 1874 and in 1894, based on a study of the existing published and manuscript material. In 1993 David Kimbell, for the Hallische Händel Ausgabe (HHA), produced a full score of the 1711 version, together with rejected draft material and the additional numbers introduced in revivals up to 1717. HHA has also produced a complete score of the 1731 version. The libretto was published in London by the Queen's Theatre in February 1711, to coincide with the premiere, with Hill's English translation. Revised versions followed in 1717 and 1731 to reflect the changes introduced in those years; Rossi is believed to have prepared the Italian additions and revisions, with the 1731 English credited to "Mr. Humphreys". Feind's German versions of the libretto were published in Hamburg in 1715, 1723 and 1727.

The first full recording of Rinaldo (an "excerpts" disc had preceded it by two years) was made in 1977 by CBS, with Carolyn Watkinson in the title role, Ileana Cotrubaș as Almirena, and Jean Claude Malgoire conducting La Grande Écurie et la Chambre du Roy. The work, recorded in a Paris church, was based on the 1711 score; Alan Blyth in Gramophone praised the standard of the singing, and despite reservations about the sound quality, called it one of the most enjoyable of available Handel opera recordings. There was no further recording of Rinaldo available until 1990, when John Fisher's heavily cut version from La Fenice was issued. Since then several more versions have been made available: Harry Bicket's 2001 recording for Arthaus, which was later issued as a DVD; René Jacobs with the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra for Harmonia Mundi in 2001; and a performance by the Aradia Ensemble under Kevin Mallon, recorded in 2004 and issued under the Naxos label in 2005.