This week’s free obtain options the music ‘Chanson de la pluie’ by the French composer Pauline Viardot, carried out on trumpet by Matilda Lloyd, with the Britten Sinfonia underneath Rumon Gamba.

It is taken from Casta Diva, an album of operatic arias transcribed for trumpet. It options transcriptions of arias by composers together with Bellini, Rossini, Donizetti and others.

And, as our reviewer Alexandra Wilson factors out, listening to an operatic aria performed by the trumpet just isn’t such an uncommon proposition.

‘The works of the bel canto opera composers have all the time been well-known to brass gamers. Their melodies had been reworked as staples of the brass-band repertoire within the Nineteenth century and continued to be performed on park bandstands and in pit villages effectively into the twentieth.

‘This album, alternatively, does one thing new in making the trumpet the solo ‘voice’ in a sequence of preparations for small orchestra by William Foster of operatic numbers and trumpet research based mostly on operatic themes by the Nineteenth-century cornetist Jean-Baptiste Arban. All are used to show the appreciable skills of younger British trumpeter Matilda Lloyd – winner of the 2014 BBC Younger Musician of the 12 months Brass Last – in addition to these of the Britten Sinfonia, on glowing type underneath the baton of Rumon Gamba.

‘In introspective arias similar to ‘Oh! mie fedeli’ from Bellini’s Beatrice Tenda and ‘Oh! quante volte’ from I Capuleti e i Montecchi Lloyd performs with intense expression and immense heat. The flawless tone, purity of line and dynamic subtlety she coaxes from her instrument are proven off to notably spectacular impact in Arban’s set of variations from Norma, within the evergreen showstopper ‘Una furtiva lagrima’ from L’elisir d’amore, and within the plaintive Prelude to Act II of Don Pasquale, all three accompanied by the orchestra with explicit tenderness.

‘Offering distinction with the plethora of early- Nineteenth-century operatic numbers are two chansons, considerably extra fashionable in model, by the mezzo-soprano, pianist and composer Pauline Viardot, a determine linked to Rossini, Donizetti et al by being a famous interpreter of bel canto roles. In Viardot’s ‘Havanaise’ and ‘Chanson de la pluie’, Lloyd demonstrates the trumpet’s capability to be sultry, virtually going right into a sort of laid-back jazz-club mode.’

Casta Diva is out now on Chandos. You could find out extra and buy the album at https://www.chandos.web/merchandise/catalogue/CHANpercent205321

Learn our evaluation in full right here.

Methods to obtain

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In case you have any issues downloading this week’s free obtain, please contact music@classical-music.com.