Christoph Willibald Gluck - Orphee et Eurydice (1774 tenor version in French) - No. 1. The Mourning of Eurydice (Richard Croft, Mireille Delunsch, Marion Harousseau & Claire Delgado-Boge; Marc Minkowski)

Though originally set to an Italian libretto, “Orfeo ed Euridice“, Gluck’s first step in his reform of the operatic form, owes much to the genre of French opera, particularly in its’ extensive use of accompanied recitative and a general absence of vocal virtuosity. In fact, it is generally supposed that Gluck frankly took Rameau’s “Castor et Pollux“ as his model when he sat down to compose “Orfeo“: indeed, the plot of the earlier work has much in common with that of “Orfeo“. Therefore, it seems quite fittin