Julia Lezhneva - Graun Arias

The Guardian 80

Lezhneva/Concerto Köln/Antonenko
(Decca)

Another impressive recital from soprano Julia Lezhneva – and this time she turns her spotlight on a composer who needs the exposure. A generation before Handel, Carl Heinrich Graun was writing Italian operas for the canary-fancying Prussian court, and excelled at virtuoso display pieces. Of Lezhneva’s 11 arias, only the furious Mi Paventi has been recorded before – but not as fast as this. Indeed, conductor Mikhail Antonenko and his energetic Concerto Köln set mercilessly swift tempos throughout.

Lezhneva, for her part, dispatches barrages of notes as fluently as if she were sitting picking them out on the piano. In a rare slow number, Piangete, from the opera Mithridate, one can admire the long, supple lines of melody even while wishing that Lezhneva had more depth to draw on, to vary her pastel-coloured tone. Yet she’s expressive throughout; she may not sing the text very clearly, but she’s still responsive to it.