Search - Goehr, Arianna Ensemble, Lacey :: Arianna

Arianna isn't a completion of Monteverdi's partially lost opera, but a recomposition by one of England's best composers, Alexander Goehr. It's a good match. Where the original music survives, Monteverdi's asymmetrical ariosos meld well with Goehr's spare, neo-primitive atonality, stylistically similar to Carl Orff's rhythmically feverish Antigonae and Hans Werner Henze's free-flowing El Cimarron. Atonal obligatos, effectively stinging percussion, and portrayal of antiquity without kitschy picturesqueness are Goehr's hallmarks, even if his own word settings lack Monteverdi's resourceful risk taking. The piece could make a good effect onstage (and a greater one on CD) in a more lived-in performance. Female voices are unattractive, the men are merely serviceable (aside from the remarkable countertenor Lawrence Zazzo as Bacchus), characterizations only scratch the surface, and the acoustic is mushy. But the work itself fascinates. --David Patrick Stearns