Julia Lezhneva

The Baroque opera stage is crowded with people from times long past and faraway countries. Ancient myth went out of fashion in the early eighteenth century; from then on the stage teemed with figures from Ancient Rome, remote Persia and the age of the Völkerwanderung, the Migration of Peoples. Yet opera at this time was nothing less than a sung history lesson, because outer and inner dramas resonating with eternal validity were played out in front of the respective historical backdrop. The scenarios showed highly emotional conflicts between love and duty, cool realpolitik and ardent passion, where freedom and virtue had to be sustained in times of extreme repression. Singers of the Baroque epoch could credibly convey these emotions, and all of them carried their personal, favourite areas with them in their luggage, for the dramaturgy of Baroque opera allowed individual arias to be replaced by so-called “suitcase arias” – insertion arias and interpolations.

The internationally celebrated soprano Julia Lezhneva has been among the fixed stars in the vocal constellation of Bayreuth Baroque ever since her debut as Gildippe in Porpora’s Carlo il Calvo. For this concert she has joined forces with Baptiste Lopez and the Basel Chamber Orchestra on a quest for extraordinarily effective “suitcase arias” from Handel’s circle. Works by Ariosti, Galuppi, Giacomelli, Hasse, Porpora and Porta make it quite clear that the great maestro from Halle was not alone in being fully aware of how to make an opera!