Trevor Pinnock, The English Concert - Händel: Belshazzar (1991)

Handel’s “Belshazzar” is one of the top five compositions by one of the top five composers of all time, which means that any serious music lover needs to become acquainted with the work. While his “Messiah” is more famous, “Belshazzar” is actually more representative of what Handel was doing after he grudgingly switched over from opera to un-staged musical dramas in English; he was still setting full-scale stories, with characters and plot conflicts. A little more than half of these works had their origins in the Old Testament or the Apocrypha, and that fact, combined with the success of “Messiah,” played a role in the long-lived historical misapprehension that Handel was essentially a religious composer. “Belshazzar” is a dramatic tale of how a powerful and arrogant civilization can suddenly collapse when its ruler is unable to read the handwriting on the wall, in this case offering the literal origin of that metaphor. The work still offers plenty of piety, given that the title character’s mother and the Persian whose cunning plan aims to capture Babylon show almost as much reverence for the Jewish God as the exiled Israelites whose long captivity is about to end. It’s a grand tale with vivid characters and expressive choruses representing three distinct nations.
So, since any real fan of musical drama needs to know “Belshazzar,” the crucial question for any recording is whether it does justice to the beauty and power of the work. In this case the answer is an unconditional “Yes!” The choir is superb, the conducting insightful, the soloists top-notch. I would rate it just a hair below the splendid recording of the work by Nicolaus Harnoncourt, but the two are so closely matched that the slightest change in one’s personal preferences would tip the scales the other way. In sheer vocalism Pinnock’s choir surpasses its rival—his choristers have a stunningly beautiful sound—but Harnoncourt’s Swedish singers provide more distinct characterization of the three different nations they represent. In fact, the sheer beauty of the soprano sound by Pinnock’s choristers in their Persian personas made me wonder for moment how that campaigning army managed to amass so many lovely-voiced camp followers. But it is obviously not much of a criticism to describe a choir as “too beautiful.”
My reasons for preferring Felicity Palmer as queen Nitocris to the always-wonderful Arlene Auger, and Harnoncourt’s Maureen Lehane as Cyrus over the excellent Catherine Robbin are equally subtle: I think the extra heft of their voices makes the one seem more maternal, the other a more convincing general, than their lighter-voiced counterparts on this recording. The counter-tenors on the two recordings battle it out to a draw; Bowman starts with some of his most ravishing singing on record, while rival Esswood sustains his own lovely tone a little longer. Both are so successful as the prophet Daniel that I couldn’t sustain my usual grumbles about conductors who cast counter-tenors in roles Handel wrote for female singers. The tenors who sing the lead roles are also a toss-up—Tear on the Harnoncourt is a tad more emphatic, Rolfe-Johnson more subtle--and both period orchestras more than measure up to the challenge.
So close are the recordings that a choice between them may well come down to price and coupling. At the moment it seems that you must spend an extra six or seven dollars for the Harnoncourt, but for that money you also get his “Jephtha.” If the latter recording was as outstanding as the “Belshazzar” I’d recommend the double set in an instant, but sadly it isn’t. I still remember my disappointment when I first bought the Harnoncourt “Jephtha” after hearing an incredible local performance of the work. I quickly realized that although the conducting was vivid and the orchestral playing superb, the singers on the recording were far inferior to the ones I had heard live. After I got Gardiner’s “Jephtha” I felt no urge to revisit the early recording. So, is it worth seven bucks to get a “Belshazzar” that’s just a tiny tad better than this one, along with a second-tier “Jephtha” with great orchestral playing and disappointing solo singing? Real fans will probably get both—after all, one’s appreciation of any masterpiece deepens with exposure to alternate interpretations--but for anyone trying to build a basic Handel collection within a reasonable budget Pinnock’s recording is the obvious choice. You’ll be choosing a tad more beauty and a touch less personality, but at this price that’s hardly a huge compromise.