The Sunday Times
'It’s a coup for Chandos to have secured the great Nicolai Gedda as the high priest. He’s 78 this year, but still sounds authoritative. Rebecca Evans and Diana Montague are as good as any international Ilia and Idamante, and Bruce Ford’s Idomeneo is probably the best around today in any language. His English diction is immaculate.'
Dramma per musica in three acts
Libretto by Giovanni Battista Varesco
after Antoine Danchet's Idomenée
English translation by David Parry
The Cast
Bruce Ford, tenor - Idomeneo
Diana Montague, mezzo-soprano - Idamante
Rebecca Evans, soprano - Ilia
Susan Patterson, soprano - Electra
Ryland Davies, tenor - Arbace
Nicolai Gedda, tenor - High Priest of Neptune
Clive Bayley, bass (PMF Scholar) - Voice of Neptune
Chorus of Opera North
Orchestra of Opera North
David Parry - conductor
Recorded in Leeds Town Hall 23-27 June 2003
Producer - Brian Couzens
Sound engineer - Ralph Couzens
Assistant engineer - Michael Common
Gramophone
'Bruce Ford makes an impressive Idomeneo, with regal grandeur as well as anguish conveyed in his shapely phrasing and his fine, clear line of tone. Diana Montague gives a strong and unaffected account of Idamate's music. The Ilia, Rebecca Evans, is especially moving in her Act 2 aria, 'Se il padre perdei', very expressively shaped... The tension underlying all Electra's music is well caught in Susan Patterson's singing, with 'D'Oreste, d'Aiace' powerfully done; but even in the more docile Act 2 aria it is conveyed in her handling of vibrato. It is quite a luxury to have Ryland Davies's model articulation in Arbace's recitatives, not to say Nicolai Gedda, in his late 70s, bringing ripe authority (and rather beautiful elderly tone) to the High Priest.
The Guardian
'Bruce Ford's Idomeneo and Diana Montague's Idamante generate tremendous power, and Susan Patterson's Elettra declines into insanity with frightening vividness. Rebecca Evans's Ilia is feistier than most... Nicolai Gedda - now in his late 70s and a great Idomeneo himself in his day - makes an appearance as the High Priest, his voice seeming miraculously untouched by time. Parry's high-voltage conducting, meanwhile, maintains the work's high emotional level throughout.'
