Search - George Frederick Handel, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Concentus Musicus Wien :: Handel: Messiah

Harnoncourt makes some interesting points in this live recording with the Concentus Musicus Wien, the Stockholm Chamber Choir, and soloists Elizabeth Gale, Marjana Lipovsek, Werner Hollweg, and Roderick Kennedy, which dates from November 1982. He takes a remarkably gentle approach with "For unto us," making it sound almost as if it were a lullaby, yet achieves real vehemence in the strings' depiction of the "refiner's fire" in "But who may abide." Unfortunately, it is in this aria that we first encounter one of the set's main problems, the rather heavily accented English of soloist Lipovsek. There is also a recognizable foreignness to the way the Swedish chorus sings, which might tend to distance an American listener from this recording. --Ted Libbey