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| Kate Lindsey, The English Concert, Harry Bicket at Wigmore Hall (Photo from Kate Lindsey's Instagram feed) |
Corelli: Concerto Grosso in D Op.6 No.1, Vivaldi: Trio Sonata in D minor Op.1 No.1 RV63 'La follia'; arias from Handel's Agrippina, Handel: Overture-Suite from Rodrigo, Handel: Donna, che in ciel; Kate Lindsey, The English Concert, Harry Bicket; Wigmore Hall
Reviewed 28 January 2026
A sparkling programme focused on Handel's early years in Rome with mezzo-soprano Kate Lindsey in fine form in arias from Handel's Agrippina and a rare performance of a relatively unknown cantata celebrating Rome's deliverance from an earthquake
The last time we saw mezzo-soprano Kate Lindsey she was playing Elisabetta in Ulrich Rasche's astonishing staging of Donizetti's Maria Stuarda on the wide-open spaces of the Grosses Festspielhaus in Salzburg [see my review]. On Wednesday 28 January 2026 she was performing in rather different repertoire in a more intimate space. Lindsey joined Harry Bicket and The English Concert for a programme of Italian Baroque music from the early 18th century centred on Rome. Lindsey sang three arias from Handel's opera Agrippina and his cantata Donna, che in ciel, and the orchestra played a suite from his early opera Rodrigo. Alongside this was instrumental music by Corelli and Vivaldi.
Rodrigo (1707), Donna, che in ciel (1707) and Agrippina (1709) all date from Handel's amazingly productive and fertile period in Italy where his music, particularly the cantatas, became a testing ground for later operatic developments. Alongside these we had Corelli's Concerto Grosso in D Op.6 No.1. Handel would model his own Opus 6 concerti grossi on Corelli's influential set (printed in 1714) and Corelli played in the orchestra for some of Handel's premieres in Rome (and the two famously had a dispute in rehearsal). Also in the programme was a Vivaldi trio sonata published in 1705. Not Roman but a complete delight as it is a set of variations on the well known tune, La Follia.
We began with Corelli and a very full stage. The orchestra fielded a whopping 13 strings (4, 4, 2, 2, 1) which gave us a wonderfully rich sound in the hall. But given my chat with conductor Jakob Lehmann about early 19th century Italian orchestras using a surprising number of cellos [see my interview], I did wonder whether there should have been more bass instruments in the mix.
In the Concerto Grosso, Corelli seems to be interested in the contrast between fast and slow. Marked grandeur moved on to fast, vivid busyness yet punctuated by slow pause points. The later movements alternated graceful elegance with vivid articulation and rhythmically marked sections, with the plangent grace of the central Largo being rather moving. The final two movements left us with vigour and lively joy. The large string ensemble meant that the tutti sections all had a remarkable richness and depth of tone to them that contrasted with the grace and transparency of the solo sections.
There was more contrast with Vivaldi's Trio Sonata in D minor as the majority of the string players retired, and the work was played by just two violinists, Nadja Zwiener and Tuomo Suni with the continuo section. The opening statement of the theme was rather stately, but then Vivaldi put it through a remarkable sequence of variations, giving the two soloists an inventive technical workout and ending with seeming unstoppable energy.
Handel's opera Agrippina, which premiered in Venice in 1709, has a libretto by Cardinal Grimani that is arguably one of the best that Handel set. The work mixes irony, humour and political intrigue in a way that the later libretti written for Handel would not do. The opera was remarkably successful and can be seen as the first of Handel's mature works.
The concert featured three contrasting arias written for the character of Nerone (originally a soprano castrato). The first two were both addressed to Poppea whom Nerone spends the opera chasing. 'Coll'ardor del tuo bel core' was all breathless and eager passion, with Lindsey singing the fast passagework with vivid vigour and making it rather up-front. Here, and elsewhere in the programme, Bicket's speeds seem to take no prisoners, but Lindsey proved technically adept and made something more of the music. For the first aria of the group, you felt that she was singing to her music stand somewhat though her manner relaxed as the evening wore one. 'Quando invita la donna l'amante' was more lyrical with a swaying siciliana rhythm in the music, and Lindsey's veiled tone made the vocal line touchingly plangent. The final aria in the group was 'Come nube che fugge dal vento', sung at the end of the opera when Nerone decides to renounce love for ambition. It is a simile aria about clouds in the wind and simply an excuse for more enjoyable vigour and bravura passagework, contrasting with the slower, more plangent middle section.
After the interval we returned to Handel's Italy but to 1707 when his first opera for Italy was presented in Florence. Generally known nowadays as Rodrigo, its original title was Vincer se stesso e la maggior vittoria (To overcome oneself is the greater victory). We heard the overture and a suite of six dances from the opera. The usual slow-fast overture contrasted grandeur with perky bounce, followed by a light Gigue, a graceful Sarabande, a rhythmic Matelot, a lightly scurrying Bourrée, an elegant Menuet and a concluding Passacaille that was rather engaging. The scoring used elements of the concerto grosso with a contrasting solo group.
We finished with Handel's cantata Donna, che in ciel from 1707 which sets an anonymous sacred (but non-liturgical) Italian text that celebrated Rome's deliverance from an earthquake in 1703 on the Feast of the Purification. The work is structurally striking with its three contrasting arias, one accompanied recitative and a final aria that includes a substantial role for the chorus. It has been argued that it was written by Handel as a calling card for his time in Rome.
The opening Introduzione featured a vividly dramatic section leading to a faster one, full of excitement. It is quite a substantial movement and Handel recycled it as the overture to his opera Agrippina, and other elements of the work reoccur in Handel's later output including in Giulio Cesare. After a rather grand recitative, the first aria contrasted the earth quaking with mortals' fear of sin and featured vividly energetic strings leading to Kate Lindsey's solo passagework which she sang with great relish and there were even some lovely duet moments with Nadja Zwiener's first violin. The middle section provided a lower tension moment. A long accompagnato moved from slow sustained to more drama, including striking trills in the strings when Lindsey sang about repentant people crying out.
The second aria, comparing the Virgin to a serene star, was more intimate and tender, performed with just continuo. Lindsey almost crooned some of it, but the total effect was rather wonderful. After a strong recitative, the third aria, referencing the dark fires of Hell, was full of fast vivid passages yet with a feeling of dancing rhythms. The final aria felt as if Handel had moved into a slightly different musical world. We left the Italian cantatas behind and with the introduction of a chorus (eight singers here), the music felt closer to some of his sacred works with the way that Lindsey's still elaborate vocal line was in dialogue with the chorus, whose role was surprisingly substantial. Here was Handel creating large-scale structures from smaller sections in a way that becomes familiar in his later works.
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