{"id":6469,"date":"2025-05-12T20:43:08","date_gmt":"2025-05-12T20:43:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nationalgunowner.org\/index.php\/2025\/05\/12\/opera-review-giulio-cesare-versus-antony-and-cleopatra\/"},"modified":"2025-05-12T20:43:08","modified_gmt":"2025-05-12T20:43:08","slug":"opera-review-giulio-cesare-versus-antony-and-cleopatra","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nationalgunowner.org\/index.php\/2025\/05\/12\/opera-review-giulio-cesare-versus-antony-and-cleopatra\/","title":{"rendered":"Opera Review: \u2018Giulio Cesare\u2019 Versus \u2018Antony and Cleopatra\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Song Hee Lee as Cleopatra amid Ruckus at Hudson Hall. Photo: Paul Kheir<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In September of 1966, the Metropolitan Opera opened its brand-new Lincoln Center home with the world premiere of samuel barber<\/a>\u2019s Antony and Cleopatra <\/i>while New York City Opera, now its close neighbor across the plaza, simultaneously served up sly counter-programming with Handel\u2019s Giulio Cesare in Egitto.<\/i> As it turned out, despite acclaim for Leontyne Price<\/a>\u2019s Cleopatra, the Barber work flopped while the Handel was a surprise hit and her <\/i>Egyptian queen made Beverly Sills<\/a> an overnight sensation.<\/p>\n

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Nearly sixty years later\u2014likely through sheer serendipity\u2014Giulio Cesare <\/i>is once again competing with Antony and Cleopatra, <\/i>the latter this time a new work by John Adams<\/a> that premieres at the Met today (May 12). Earlier this spring, however, Handel\u2019s work turned up in two guises: a fully staged production by R.B. Schlather at Hudson Hall and a concert version by conductor Harry Bicket<\/a> and The English Concert for their annual visit to Carnegie Hall. If neither proved entirely satisfying, both proved brave attempts to do justice to one of baroque opera\u2019s most complex and challenging masterpieces.<\/p>\n

Opera seria, <\/i>the genre in which Handel worked, is rigidly constructed of solo da capo <\/i>arias connected by recitatives with an occasional duet or trio tossed in. Giulio Cesare <\/i>is by far the longest of the composer\u2019s works, and its original 1724 version contains more than thirty solos, nearly all da capo <\/i>arias in A-B-A\u2019 form. The acclaimed Ren\u00e9 Jacobs recording from the early 1990s contains more than four hours of music, which means that most contemporary performances of Giulio Cesare <\/i>will be abridged. The dilemma then becomes whether to omit an aria entirely or to include a partial version: neither of this spring\u2019s editions solved it satisfactorily.<\/p>\n

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Since it began its Carnegie series of Handel operas and oratorios, The English Concert has presented its offerings complete or only slightly cut. It was then a shock when, due to time restrictions imposed by the venue, Cesare <\/i>lost nine numbers. Those omissions seriously unbalanced the carefully wrought libretto of Nicola Haym<\/a>, which intertwines the love story of Caesar and Cleopatra with the trials and tribulations of Pompey\u2019s widow Cornelia and son Sesto. The latter lost two of his five arias while Achilla, one of Cornelia\u2019s aggressive suitors, was permitted just one of his three.<\/p>\n

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Chuanyuan Liu and Meridian Prall as Tolomeo and Cornelia. Photo: Paul Kheir<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The excisions in the Hudson Hall staging (which lasted just three hours, including a single intermission) were even more drastic: not only were complete arias omitted, but a good number of the remaining ones were reduced by two-thirds to just their initial A section. Given Schlather\u2019s infectious enthusiasm for Handel opera\u2014Cesare <\/i>is the second in a series presented in Hudson, a scenic town two hours north of New York City, after he previously directed Alcina <\/i>and Orlando <\/i>in Manhattan\u2014it\u2019s puzzling that he abridges the works he mounts so severely.<\/p>\n