Reviews and occasional notes on classical music

Reviews and occasional notes on classical music

"Music, both vocall and instrumental, so good, so delectable, so rare, so admirable, so super excellent, that it did even ravish and stupifie all those strangers that never heard the like." - Thomas Coryat, after hearing 3 hours of music at the Scuola di San Rocco in Venice, 1608.

Sunday, November 1, 2015

For fans only

From June 21, 2013:



Quebec lyric tenor Marc Hervieux has a strong, strong voice, and I admired his musicianship on two opera recital discs he's recorded for ATMA. The repertoire in this new disc "Mes plaisirs" isn't to my taste, but the voice is certainly still there, and is enthusiastically applauded by the audience at the Grand Theatre de Quebec. There's not a lot of variety in the arrangements of these "favourite" songs, by Simon Leclerc, and Hervieux is singing full-bore for much of the time. Beautiful tone, plenty of volume, holding power: Hervieux has those in abundance. But he doesn't have a chance to show his full range; of colour, of drama, of simple volume. This "cross-over" disc is for fans, or those who don't want too much taste or nuance to get in the way of dramatic cresendos and crashing climaxes.

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