on record

Record producers do not have to concern themselves overmuch with libretti. If there is more than one version they need to find the most authentic, or the most appropriate to their purposes, and all they have to do then is get them translated into one or two languages and printed in the liner notes. How effective they are on the stage is not their problem. So if you want to hear The Reluctant King as Le Roi malgré lui in the original French and in the original sixteenth-century Polish setting - where Henri de Valois, Duc d’Anjou, has been made King of Poland, much against his will, and secretly joins in a conspiracy to get himself deposed - you could do a lot worse than get hold of the Erato CDs 2292-45792-2.

It is true that the Erato text departs from the original to the extent that it incorporates some of Albert Carré’s 1929 revisions, that it excludes Alexina’s aria and that it cuts out all the dialogue. But these are minor considerations in a situation where the music is so persuasively presented and where, anyway, there is no alternative version. Based on a concert performance given by Radio France in 1984, the recording is most stylishly conducted by Charles Dutoit, who contrives to give the ceremonial, sometimes even grand-opera element in the score its full due without in any way sacrificing either its comedy or its lyricism. He and the engineers had some trouble in clarifying Chabrier’s more complex ensembles but, with both the Nouvel Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France and the chorus thoroughly well rehearsed for the occasion, the sound is generally excellent. In a strong cast headed by Gino Quilico as a poetic Henri de Valois, Barbara Hendricks is outstanding as a brilliantly agile Minka and there are good performances from Peter Jeffes as Nangis, Isabel Garcisanz as Alexina and Jean-Philippe Lafont as Fritelli - the last-named character, some of tonight’s audience may be surprised to learn, being Alexina’s husband in the original version.

Gerald Larner