R E V I E W S:

Music for the Royal Fireworks, Water Music
"The performances from Marriner and the Academy remain among the finest performances ever committed to disc."
-- Penguin Guide [2003/4 Edition]

Concerti grossi, Op. 6
"The Op. 6 set is very much the best available of these masterly works. Its salient characteristics are, first, brisk tempos; second, a general care over matters of baroque performing practice (double continuo, rhythmic changes, decoration); third, plenty of rhythmic life...there are finely light-footed dance movements and much sweet tone and beauitful phrasing in some of the slow ones."
-- Gramophone [9/1971]

Trio Sonatas
"While the members of the Academy Chamber Ensemble may use modern instruments, they achieve an excellent sense of period style and faultless intonation. The Trio Sonatas are varied in instrumentation but all have a refreshing vigour and warmth."
-- Penguin Guide [2003/4 Edition]

Messiah
"This recording...made a stunning impact on me. The pace is unflagging, every member of the orchestra plays like a virtuoso, and the chorus practically dance their way to redemption...This is Messiah as Handel surely meant it to be."
-- Gramophone /12/1978]

Israel in Egypt
"With the period instruments of the Brandenburg Consort speeds are fast and textures light...The soloists are first rate, notably the tenor, Ian Bostrdge, characterful in linking recitative, with Susan Gritton the sweet-toned soprano."
-- Penguin Guide [2003/4 Edition]

Hercules
"Gardiner seeks here as elsewhere to illuminate the score with greater attention to nuance and detail than anyone else has ever lavished upon it. This is beautiful music, beautifully performed."
-- Gramophone [1/1988]

Judas Maccabaeus
"Charles Mackerras has always favoured incisive rhythms, clear textures, light bowing and carefully varied articulation in Baroque music. The ECO responds with verve to the wondrous grace and variety of Handel’s music...Who would willingly trade a cast of Ryland Davies as Maccabaeus, John Shirley-Quirk as Simon, the incomparable Felicity Palmer and Janet Baker, at the height of their powers, as the Israelitish Woman and Man, for another? Not I."
-- Stephen Pettitt, BBC Music Magazine

Solomon
"McCreesh makes the most of Handel’s expressive range, drawing stylish playing from his orchestra and assured singing from his chorus...The effect of the performance as a whole is deeply impressive, with such things as ‘Will the sun’, the grave interlude to ‘With pious heart’ and the elegiac chorus ‘Draw the tear from hopeless love’ haunting one’s mind." -- Lionel Salter, Gramophone [3/1999]

Giulio Cesare
"Anne Sofie von Otter is a delight as Sesto. A forceful and energetic Achillas is provided by Alan Ewing. The theatrical vitality of the Minkowski perhaps secures it first place. It’s certainly a version of this fine opera that any Handelian will want to hear." -- Stanley Sadie, Gramophone [11/2003]