Pergolesi: L’Olimpiade album review – fast driving and a rare animated master crew | classical music

pEtro Metastasio’s tale of the dirty deeds of the ancient Olympic Games proved so popular that more than 60 composers composed it, including Caldara (for whom it was written), Vivaldi and Cherubini. Pergolesi’s version, first performed in 1735 and revived in 1937, is among the best, heralding what should have been a glorious operatic career had the composer not died at the age of 26.

The story begins when the formidable Megacle is persuaded to compete disguised as his hot and not-quite-honorable friend Licida. What Megacle doesn’t know is that the prize is the hand of Aristia, the woman he fell in love with. Throw in Licida’s outcast lover Argene disguised as a shepherdess and discover that Licida is actually Aristea’s long-lost twin and you have all the ingredients for a plot of mind-boggling complexity.

Alessandro De Marchi scored a somewhat rambling four-hour epic in 2010, but unobtrusive cuts in Giulio Brandi’s two-and-a-half-hour version ensure the drama slips by. The performance is perfectly fast, and Ghislieri’s orchestral playing is tense and tight, even if the recording lacks the sonic depth of De Marchi’s narration.

In the impressive cast, Carlotta Colombo stands out as the wealthy Aristia, a subtle contrast to Silvia Frigato’s melancholy Arjène. José María Lo Monaco’s supple mezzo-soprano music lends just the right complexity to Lyseda, with Theodora Raftis’ convincingly boyish Megacle. Recorded at the Teatro Pergolesi, an 18th-century theater in Jesi (Ancona) – Pergolesi’s hometown, in 2025. It includes stage noise and some annoying intermittent applause, but nonetheless conveys the excitement of a live performance.

Listen on Apple Music (above) or Spotify