JEAN-BAPTISTE LULLY

Proserpine
Tragédie lyrique de Jean-Baptiste Lully

CD I [75:25]
Prologue
Acte Premier
Acte Deuxième (Scènes 1-7)

CD II [76:55]
Acte Deuxième (Scènes 8-9)
Acte Troisième
Acte Quatrième
Acte Cinquième

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About this CD

Hervé Niquet's long-term project to breathe new life into the French Baroque operatic tradition yields another exciting new discovery with the tragédie lyrique composed by Jean- Baptiste Lully in 1680, Proserpine. Following a three year gap in their collaboration, Jean- Baptiste Lully and librettist Philippe Quinault had reunited to create Proserpine, a reflection of the increasing maturity of Lully as a composer as much as the mastery of Quinault in penning lyrical dramas centred on mythological stories. Three centuries after the first performance in Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Hervé Niquet and Le Concert Spirituel pay tribute to the genius of Lully with a new recording of Proserpine made just after stagings in both Paris and Versailles. Proserpine helps to place in context the two other tragédies recently released by Niquet and his team - Destouches "Callirhoé and Marais" Sémélé, both written a generation after Lully's masterpiece. Together with a cast of top soloists well - versed in the demands of French Baroque singing and with his incomparable Le Concert Spirituel, Hervé Niquet once more conjures up a dramatic feast.