Handel’s music drama Hercules opened in 1745 to an almost empty house at Covent Garden, where the composer was waging a turf war in trying to get his operas heard. Had circumstances been different at its premiere, the work might now be more popular, as it’s one of his most accomplished operatic scores. Despite the title, the most significant role belongs to Hercules’s wife, Dejanira, who murders him out of (unfounded) suspicion of infidelity after his last great military victory. The morality-play aspect of the plot (read: jealousy is bad, especially when it’s baseless) is tempered by its tight structure, and Handel responds with some of his most imposing music.

This recording was taken from live performances recorded in 2000 by Radio France. Marc Minkowski has pretty much established himself as the pre-eminent conductor of Handel’s operas, thanks to his dynamic way with this music: he and his crack period-instrument band get every ounce of intensity out of the bold harmonies and dramatic musical effects. Gidon Saks as Hercules and Anne Sofie von Otter as Dejanira bring nuance and complexity to their roles, as well as great singing. They make Hercules’s death scene in the third act — followed by Dejanira’s sublime "Where shall I fly?" — a moment as heavy with emotion as anything in Strauss or Wagner. Richard Croft, Lynne Dawson, and the great countertenor David Daniels fill out the unbeatable cast.