Handel: Agrippina

Disc 1
1	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
2	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
3	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
4	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
5	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
6	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
7	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
8	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
9	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
10	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
11	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
12	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
13	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
14	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
15	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
16	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
17	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
18	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
19	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
20	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
21	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
23	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
24	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
25	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
Disc 2
1	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
2	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
3	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
4	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
5	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
6	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
7	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
8	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
9	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
10	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
11	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
12	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
13	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
14	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
15	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
16	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
17	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
18	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
19	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
20	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
21	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
22	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
Disc 3
1	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
2	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
3	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
4	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
5	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
6	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
7	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
8	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
9	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
10	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
11	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
12	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
13	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
14	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
15	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
16	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
17	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
18	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
19	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
20	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
21	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
22	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
23	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6:
Handel: Agrippina
1.	Agrippina, opera, HWV 6 3:37:02
	Composed by George Frideric Handel
	Performed by Donna Brown, Michael Chance, Julian Clarkson, English Baroque Soloists, Della Jones, Jonathan Peter Kenny, Alastair Miles, George Mosley, Anne Sofie von Otter and Derek Lee Ragin
	Conducted by John Eliot Gardiner

All Music Guide

Premiered in Venice during the winter of 1709-1710, Handel's "Agrippina" played an amazing 27 times in succession and crowned the 25-year-old German composer's stay in Italy. Although grander operas followed after Handel moved to England, "Agrippina" is still a fully mature, superbly realized, and brilliantly musical work. Cardinal Grimani's libretto is loosely based on Roman history, but Handel transforms the Cardinal's improbable characters and unlikely situations into profoundly human individuals in intensely dramatic circumstances through music that expresses their deepest fears and passion with uncanny accuracy. In this wonderfully cast performance led by John Eliot Gardiner, "Agrippina" comes alive as a convincing theatrical experience. Alastair Miles is doubting but commanding as the Emperor Claudius. Derek Lee Ragin is guileless but conniving as the young Nero. Della Jones is maternal but utterly ruthless as Agrippina. But though his soloists are impressive, this is Gardiner's show and his grasp of the characters, the plot, and the music is astonishing. However improbable Grimani's characters -- and portraying Nero as a feckless love-struck teenager is not the greatest improbability -- and however unlikely the situations -- and having three different Emperors hiding simultaneously in three different closets in Agripinna's bedroom in Act III is not the least unlikely -- Gardiner paces, balances, and drives Handel's music with the sure hand of a master-showman. Though fans of Tacitus and Suetonius may object, taken on its own terms, Gardiner's "Agrippina" is a tremendously entertaining opera.

Though recorded in St. Giles Cripplegate in November 1991 and in All Hallows London in March 1992, Philips digital recording seamlessly blends the performances into a single, clear, warm whole. James Leonard

Gramophone

Any admirer of countertenor singing should be prepared to buy the set for Michael Chance’s singing alone.... Della Jones gives a masterful performance in the title-role.... [Gardiner] is a fine and very experienced conductor of Handel and he has a sure feeling for tempo and for the character of each movement.... Comfortably among the half-dozen finest recordings of Handel operas.

BBC Music Magazine

The cast is not only without a weak link, but well chosen to point up the characterisation. Della Jones in the title role manages to sound both like a ruthless schemer, with an aptly sinister edge to her tone, and a tormented woman. Barry Millington