Nicola Porpora: Ifigenia In Aulide – Christophe Rousset

Recorded here for the first time, after a brilliant performance at the 2025 Bayreuth Festival, Porpora’s Ifigenia in Aulide is one of the composer’s masterpieces. With this album, Christophe Rousset returns both to Porpora, whose music he notably championed in the album Farinelli: A Portrait, and to Ann Hallenberg, who leads a superb cast including Mélissa Petit in the title role. To introduce this opera, Christophe Rousset’s own words are probably the most eloquent: “Porpora’s work has always been of great interest to me. His style is galant, pre-Classical, and characterised by great lyricism, absolutely magnificent vocal lines and great virtuosity in the fast arias. Ifigenia in Aulide transports us to an eighteenth century that will appeal to a wide range of Baroque enthusiasts, and tells a wonderful story, encompassing the full range of emotions that one hopes to find in opera. Faced with the great tragedy of having to sacrifice one’s own daughter to satisfy the gods, we experience the parents’ despair, as well as the sense of honor and duty embodied by Ifigenia.”