The Leading Classical Music Label Direct To You

Read reviews, listen to the music, and purchase the COMPACT DISC Purcell: The Tempest

Customer Service Toll Free 866.489.4152

Flash 9 required. Click to download.

Narrow your search
with our Music Browser

Classical Music

        Ballet
        Chamber Music
        Choral
        Concertos
        Film Music
        Folk Legends
        Instrumental
        Musicals
        Opera / Operetta
        Orchestral
        Vocal

Jazz

Jazz Contemporary
Jazz Icons

New Age

Wind Band

World

        Ballad
        Bhuddist
        Chinese Music
        Classical (World)
        Early Music (World)
        Folk
        Gamelan
        Gypsy
        Hindustani
        Jazz (World)
        Klezmer
        Sufi
        Vocal (World)
        World

Special Offers:

Free MP3 Downloads

A Special Offer for Valentines

Catalogs

Internship Opportunities

Celebrating Black History

Masters of American Music

53rd Annual Grammy� Award Winners

Clearance

Penguin Guide

200 Essential Recordings

Recently Released

Upcoming Releases

SACD

DVD

        Ballet DVD
        Classical Concert
        Classical Documentary
        Dance Documentary
        Opera DVD

Audio Books

        Anthologies / Collections
        Arts
        Biographies
        Children's Classics
        Classic Fiction
        Great Epics and Tales
        History
        Junior Classic Fiction
        Junior History
        Literature
        Music Biographies
        Music Education
        Non-Fiction
        Philosophy
        Plays - Others
        Plays - Shakespeare
        Poetry
        Religion
        Samplers
        Sports
        Wine Guide

NaxosDirect Podcasts

Video Librarian Reviews

Labels

Naxos Label

        Naxos American Classics
        Naxos Best Of...
        Naxos Box Sets
        Naxos Cinema Classics
        Naxos Classics
        Naxos DVD
        Naxos DVD-Audio
        Naxos International
        Naxos Jazz
        Naxos Limited Edition
        Naxos Milken Archives
        Naxos Night Music
        Naxos Opera
        Naxos Orchestral
        Naxos Special Release
        Naxos Wind Band Classics
        Naxos World

Composers

Conductors

Ensembles

Orchestras

Choirs

Artists

Instruments

Producers

Purcell: The Tempest

Home

Naxos Label

Naxos Classics

View large image

$9.99 (COMPACT DISC)

This item is currently out of stock.

Link to this COMPACT DISC Link to this page

Henry Purcell (1659-1695) The Tempest; If ever I more riches did desire; Trumpet Pieces The English composer Henry Purcell died at a tragically young age, a...

Read more about this recording

Henry Purcell (1659-1695)

The Tempest; If ever I more riches did desire; Trumpet Pieces

The English composer Henry Purcell died at a tragically young age, a victim of a cold he caught, having been locked out by his wife because he had come home too late, according to one account of the matter. Yet, for his thirty-six years, he wrote an extraordinary amount of music, both religious and secular. By the age of eighteen he had spent eight years in the service of the Chapel Royal, until 1673 as a chorister and thereafter as an assistant to the Keeper of the King's Instruments. By 1677, when he was appointed by King Charles II to the post of Composer in Ordinary for the Violins, on the death of his friend and mentor, Matthew Locke, he had already been composing for ten years.

With the restoration of the English monarchy in 1660, King Charles II, who had spent part of his exile in France, was quick to bring back music again to the court and theatre. He restored the practices of the Church of England which had prevailed before the ten years of Puritan dictatorship and established a Band of Twenty-Four Violins on the model of the Vingt-Quatre Violons of Louis XIV. This is the model used for the present recording.

The setting of Abraham Cowley's If ever I more riches did desire, Z.

544, a poem based on Seneca, was written in the 1680s, presumably for performance at court. It is a type of miniature cantata on the theme of the transitoriness of life. Central is the ground for tenor, Here let my life with as much silence slide, in which the descending figure in the bass symbolizes the inexorable passing of time. This sets up a poignant mood of yearning with the violin and voice. The work prefigures the dramatic music of the 1690s.

The return of King Charles II had a huge impact on the theatre. After years of disuse under the rule of Cromwell, the theatres were reopened and there was a new explosion of creativity. Old plays were rewritten or adapted in various ways, with the ever-present example of French opera and ballet. The result was an increase in the amount of music and dance in the plays, but, while the French and Italians had developed the form of opera, a continuous flow of dramatic music, composers in England at this time favoured masques, additional elements usually between acts of a play and not central to the dramatic theme. With Purcell's hand the music came to rival the spoken text resulting in what Roger North called a semi-opera. Dioclesian, The Fairy Queen, King Arthur and The Indian Queen stand on their own, even without the spoken text.

The music for The Tempest is a characteristic example of theatre-music of the time. The first Restoration revival of Shakespeare's play The Tempest was in 1667 in an adaptation by John Dryden. This was revised in 1674 by Thomas Shadwell with a version that seems to have been used until the 1690s, when the adaptation presented here, and long attributed to Purcell, became popular. Nevertheless only Dorinda's song, Dear pretty youth ([10]) is definitely by Purcell. For this reason this beautiful music has enjoyed less favour. Even in his later works Purcell never wrote Italianate da capo arias, as heard here, and this has added further doubt to its authenticity.

The version of The Tempest presented on this recording is from an early eighteenth century copy (attributed to Purcell) in the library of the University of Toronto. It differs from other versions in depicting the characters of the second act as Spirits and not Devils and in the omission of the chorus Nereids and Tritons from the fifth act. The Dance of the Winds ([5]), Come unto these yellow sands ([6]) and Dance of the Spirits ([9]), exist in two-part versions and so were reconstructed by the conductor. We have added the Overture (Z. 770), which is a French- style overture to an unknown Purcell work and ended with the Chacony (Z.

730), a well-known example of Purcell's inventive imagination, a movement on a ground-bass with some eighteen repetitions of the same bass-line in four minutes of music.

The two trumpet works by Purcell included confirm the view that the most interesting trumpet writing in the seventeenth century was his. It has been suggested that the Sonata in D, Z. 850, may be the overture to a lost Purcell ode, Light of the World.

Other matters worthy of note in this recording are the use of the wind-machine ([5]), reconstructed after seventeenth-century models. As was usual at the time, particularly in France, and following the practices of both the Band of Twenty-Four Violins and the French court Vingt-Quatre Violons, oboes, recorders and bassoons are added to the score.

Kevin Mallon

Disc 1

Overture in G minor, Z. 772

(more info)

Composed by: Henry Purcell
Conducted by: Kevin Mallon
Katherine McGillivray, viola
Rachel Byrt, viola

Overture, Z. 770 - 3:26

The Tempest, Z. 631, "The Enchanted Island"

(more info)

Performed by: Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
Composed by: Henry Purcell
Conducted by: Andrew Davis Kevin Mallon Charles Rosekrans John Radcliffe Williams
Nils Brown, tenor
Michael Colvin, tenor
Paul Grindlay, bass-baritone
Meredith Hall, soprano
Rosemarie van der Hooft, mezzo-soprano
Gillian Keith, soprano
Brett Polegato, baritone
Valerian Ruminski, bass

Act II Masque of Spirits: No. 2 - Trio and Chorus - 2:13
Act II Masque of Spirits: No. 3 - Trio and Chorus - 1:45
Act II Masque of Spirits: No. 4 - Air - 3:09
Act II Masque of Spirits: No. 5 - Dance of the Winds - 1:16
Act II Masque of Spirits: No. 6 - Song and Chorus - 3:57
Act II Masque of Spirits: No. 7 - Air - 5:34
Act II Masque of Spirits: No. 8 - Air - 0:58
Act II Masque of Spirits: No. 9 - Dance of Spirits - 0:38
Act II Masque of Spirits: No. 10 - Air - 1:58
Act V Neptune' Masque: No. 11 - Recitative and Air Amphitrite - 4:05
Act V Neptune's Masque: No. 12 - Recitative and Air - 3:09
Act V Neptune's Masque: No. 13 - Recitative and Air - 4:24
Act V Neptune's Masque: No. 14 - Air - 7:27
Act V Neptune's Masque: No. 15 - Air - 5:01
Act V Neptune's Masque: No. 16 - Duet and Chorus - 3:16

Chacony in G minor, Z. 730

(more info)

Composed by: Henry Purcell
Conducted by: Kevin Mallon Bernard Labadie
Risa Browder, violin

Chacony, Z. 730 - 4:32

If ever I more riches did desire, Z. 544

(more info)

Composed by: Henry Purcell
Conducted by: Kevin Mallon
Nils Brown, tenor
Paul Grindlay, bass-baritone
Meredith Hall, soprano
Gillian Keith, soprano

If ever I more riches did desire, Z. 544 - 11:42

The Indian Queen, Z. 630

(more info)

Performed by: Philharmonia Orchestra
Composed by: Henry Purcell
Conducted by: Kevin Mallon David Parry
Yvonne Kenny, soprano
Norman Engel, trumpet

Trumpet Overture to 'The Indian Queen', Z. 630 - 3:23

Trumpet Sonata in D major, Z. 850

(more info)

Performed by: Hungarian State Opera Chamber Orchestra Orchestra of the Golden Age
Composed by: Henry Purcell
Conducted by: Robert Glenton Kevin Mallon
Ede Inhoff, trumpet
Norman Engel, trumpet
David Staff, trumpet

I Allegro - 1:25
II Adagio - 1:17
III Allegro - 1:49

Reviews

Be the first to review this title

FREE SHIPPING on orders
of 5 items or more!

Earn Naxos Rewards Points by opening an account and buying your favorite music today! Create your account here.

See all of our great site features here.

Flash 9 required. Click to download.

Composer(s):
Purcell, Henry

Conductor(s):
Mallon, Kevin

Artist(s):
Brown, Nils; Colvin, Michael; Engel, Norman; Grindlay, Paul; Hall, Meredith; Hooft, Rosemarie van der; Keith, Gillian; Polegato, Brett

Label: Naxos Classics
UPC: 636943426227
Item Number: 8554262
Release Date: Oct 1, 2000