Opera Award: Jean-Christophe Spinosi

The staunch champion of Vivaldi's operas triumphs again, his characterful Griselda beating contending recordings of Wagner and Haydn to win this year's Opera Award.

Vivaldi - Griselda
Ensemble Matheus / Jean-Christophe Spinosi

Naive OP 30419

Click on the link below to hear the opening Sinfonia of Vivaldi's Griselda

What the Jury said:
"Vivaldi's operas are coming thick and fast on disc these days, and musically this is one of the finest. The varied orchestral writing is vividly played, and there's some astonishing solo singing."

It's remarkable enough that French conductor Jean-Christophe Spinosi has won the Opera category with a relatively unknown opera by Vivaldi. All the more extraordinary though, that this is his second consecutive win in that category, as last year he won with another Vivaldi opera, Orlando furioso.

Spinosi is mindful of this single achievement by himself and his team of musicians: 'the fact that Vivaldi has triumphed two years in a row over Handel and Mozart should incite those whose virgin ears have yet to hear this music to have the curiosity to give it a listen!' he says bullishly.

That said, Spinosi argues that Griselda is an even greater, or at least more mature work than Orlando, and so perhaps even worthier of the award: 'Orlando is a more hybrid work than Griselda, which is a work of high maturity and has a more homogeneous balance between the virtuoso singing and the orchestra's role.'

Certainly Griselda met with great success at the box office in Vivaldi's time, and should need no special pleading now that a Vivaldi revival appears to be in full swing.

Spinosi is clearly a man with a mission: 'Vivaldi's music has often erroneously been categorised as easy music,' he says; 'That today serious music publications like BBC Music Magazine value this heritage is an important step in showing that Vivaldi first of all wrote great music and that he shares with, for example, Mozart, the ease of going straight to the listener's heart with just a few notes.'

It should perhaps be no surprise, then, that Spinosi now has his eyes on recording one of Mozart's most celebrated music dramas: The Magic Flute. Fans of Spinosi's series of Vivaldi operas, on the other hand, may be disappointed to learn that he only intends to record one more - the relatively better-known La fida ninfa - in 2008. 'This is a personal choice,' he explains; 'we were swept up in a passion, but I do feel that it has now played itself out. Four is already quite a few! In principal I will not return to this field, though one should measure one's words. There is a French proverb: Never say "Fountain, I will never drink your water again".'

BBC Music Magazine, May 2007