Mozart - The Magic Flute - Jacobs, Akademie fur Alte Musik Berlin, RIAS Kammerchor

 

Release Date: September 14, 2010 Label: Harmonia Mundi Number of discs: 3 Composer:  W.A. Mozart Performer: Rene Jacobs, Akademie fur Alte Musik Berlin cd info/ buy

Review:

René Jacobs ongoing coverage of the entire Mozart opera oeuvre continues with The Magic Flute, performed as usual with the RIAS Kammerchor and Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin. You never quite know what to expect as you peel the cellophane off a new René Jacobs recording of a Mozart opera, except that his approach is likely to be distinctly different from any you might have heard before. True to form, his new recording of The Magic Flute doesn't disappoint. As well as including virtually every word of the extensive dialogue that occurs between the musical numbers, much of which is usually cut on disc, his version incorporates an array of spectacular sound effects, noises off and even improvised lounge music to underpin some of the speech and bring the whole effect close to old-fashioned melodrama. Jacobs isn't deliberately iconoclastic, though. He doesn't set out to be different, or with the intention of surprising or shocking his listeners. Instead, what he tries to do, he says, is to approach every piece, whether it's something familiar such as Flute or Figaro, or a historical curiosity such as Antigona by Mozart's contemporary Tommaso Traetta (which he's due to tackle in 2011), as if it were a brand-new score no one has ever heard. Jacobs' approach is undoubtedly refreshing and, as always, everything is executed with the utmost committment, not to mention gloriously virtuosic playing from the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin.

 

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