Rodrigo

"Vurdering: Diapason d'or".

"What really swings the balance in favour of the new recording is the superb sound and López Banzo's direction. It hardly seems to matter to him or his brilliant Spanish musicians that Rodrigo is incomplete and that some of its music is second-division Handel. Indeed they make much of it sound better than it is. Hardcore Handelians will have to add this new version to their collection, and to Rodrigo first-timers I would recommend it as the yardstick recording by a whisker".

"At its best, the music of Rodrigo has an invigorating freshness, its raw, sometimes gawky energy tempered by an Italianate melodic suavity that Handel had honed in his cantatas ... Cummings directs his expert band of Handelians with more theatrical flair and rhythmic brio than [Alan] Curtis ... Cummings fields the more consistently satisfying cast, and makes the opera more dramatically compelling - the clinching factor for me".