Palace Concerts

Artists

Europa Galante

Fabio Biondi, violin and director

Vivica Genaux, mezzo-soprano (Piacere)

Sonia Prina, alto (Disinganno)

Marie Lys, soprano (Bellezza)

Francesco Marsiglia, tenor (Tempo)

Program

Il trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno

Oratorio in two acts, HWV 46a (1707)

Music by George Frideric Handel (1685-1759) and libretto by Benedetto Pamphili (1653-1730)

An Allegory about Vanity

When Handel arrived in Italy at the end of 1706, opera was prohibited in Rome, but this did not deprive the cardinals and aristocrats in the papal capital of the passions that great lyrical works used to bring about, which they masked in the form of oratorios. Handel was a quick learner. Supported by his powerful patrons (the Marquis Ruspoli, Cardinals Pamphili, Ottoboni and Colonna) he had no rest until in the spring of 1707 he wrote his first oratorio, and he did so on a text by Cardinal Pamphili, an authentic Baroque Vanitas made music, inasmuch as in it the brevity of beauty and pleasures are invoked in the face of the rigors of Time. A fully Italian work, which Fabio Biondi will handle at the lead of his ensemble Europa Galante and an extraordinary cast of international soloists.