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Label Challenge Classics |
UPC 0608917297324 |
Catalogue number CC 72973 |
Release date 05 April 2024 |
"This is a world-class voice that Verhaar can color and shade at will, turn cartwheels with, and use to go speeding down the Handel highway at 90 mph. It is a joy to hear, except when he is trying to make us sad, as he does in the aria from Samson, which he sings with memorable poignancy. La Sfera Armoniosa and Mike Fentross complement Verhaar's beautiful, exciting singing with nuanced and polished musicianship. All in all, their contribution to "Freedom" is just as important and impressive as Verhaar's."
Fanfare Magazine, 01-11-2024Conductor/lutenist Mike Fentross has largely earned his credits as an early music specialist. He is working all over Europe as a conductor, soloist and basso continuo player and he is professor of lute and basso continuo at the Royal Conservatory The Hague. In 2006 he founded the baroque orchestra La Sfera Armoniosa.
Mike Fentross conducted in many festivals and concerthalls like the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. the Festival van Vlaanderen, Festival d’Ambronay, Festival Oude Muziek Utrecht, Musikfestspiele Potsdam Sanssouci, Paradiso Amsterdam, Monteverdi Festival Cremona, Festival de Musica Portico de Zamora, Festival Musica Antiqua Brugge, Vantaa Early Music Festival, Bayreuth Barock and Muziekcentrum Vredenburg in Utrecht. For two times
he had the honour to conduct in the presence of Queen Beatrix of Holland. In 1988 Mike Fentross graduated at the Royal Conservatory The Hague where he studied with lute pionier Toyohiko Satoh. In 1994 he won the Van Wassenaer Competition in Amsterdam with violinist Helene Schmitt. He played chamber music with musicians as Yo Yo Ma, Ton Koopman, Janine Jansen, Marion Verbruggen, Sonia Prina, Maria Bajo, Wilbert Hazelzet, Bruce Dickey, Lucy van Dael, Andrew Lawrence King, Philippe Jarousski, Eduardo Lopez Banzo, Skip Sempe and Gerard Lesne. Mike has recorded more than 75 cd’s.
He studied conducting with Stefan Pas. As conductor he debuted in 1999 with La Dafne from Marco da Gagliano in a production of the New Opera Academie in Amsterdam. In 2006 he conducted in the presence of Queen Beatrix the modern world premiere from the opera l’Ipermestra from Cavalli in a prestigeous jubilee production from the Utrecht Early Music Festival and in 2008 he conducted a second unearthed Cavalli opera La Rosinda in a production from the Musikfestspiele Potsdam Sanssouci Potsdam. In 2009 he conducted for the first time in the big hall from the Amsterdam Concertgebouw and in the same year he was musical director in the production Granida performed in the presence of Queen Beatrix. About his debut as conductor from the Dutch Chamber Choir in 2010 in the Concertgebouw the press wrote: Conductor Mike Fentross rivalled Caravaggio with the score of the Maria Vespers. His first time conducting the Nederlands Kamerkoor was a resounding success.
Mike doesn’t only conduct Early Music, in 2004 he conducted Pierrot Lunaire from Arnold Schoenberg. The press wrote: There was great enthusiasm for Mike Fentross as conductor of a double bill consisting of Monteverdi’s Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda and Schoenberg’s Pierrot lunaire. Mike Fentross gave a performance of Pierrot lunaire that ‘appeared to come from another planet’.
In 2012 Mike made his Austrian debut in the Haydn Festival Eisenstadt with great success in a program with coloratura soprano Simone Kermes and in the same year he conducted the pre jubilee concert for the Concertgebouw in a program with solo violinist Lucy van Dael and singers Henk Neven and Andreas Scholl. In 2013 he conducted the Fairy Queen with his orchestra and the Netherlands Chamberchoir.
Since 2013 he is regularly conducting the baroque orchestra and choir of the Royal Conservatory. In 2014 he was invited by Paradiso Orchestra to conduct Beethovens Eroica. In 2016 he conducted the Netherlands Chamber Choir in a Bach, Faure program live broadcast on national radio.
This is a world-class voice that Verhaar can color and shade at will, turn cartwheels with, and use to go speeding down the Handel highway at 90 mph. It is a joy to hear, except when he is trying to make us sad, as he does in the aria from Samson, which he sings with memorable poignancy.
La Sfera Armoniosa and Mike Fentross complement Verhaar's beautiful, exciting singing with nuanced and polished musicianship. All in all, their contribution to "Freedom" is just as important and impressive as Verhaar's.
Fanfare Magazine, 01-11-2024
...Verhaar has an arresting voice that serves Handel well. It is clear and strong with little of the annoying hooty, man-singing-in-falsetto sound most of us have been exposed to over the years. Verhaar also has a lot of color in his sound and has no difficulty with the coloratura with which Handel sprinkles his music, sometimes liberally.
La Sfera Armoniosa offers vivid accompaniment under Mark Fentross’s fleet baton. The sound is excellent.
American Record Guide, 01-9-2024
The playlist of Verhaar's Freedom in the ear, the music becomes productively transparent to the dark side of beauty. It's about raising awareness and asking a lot of new and uncomfortable questions. But when the shadows are cast, the conditions also become more vivid; you can hear how much this moving, refined Handel music was wrested from a not at all beautiful world. The beautiful alongside the terrible, we must learn to see it together.
VAN-Magazin, 19-6-2024
The singer is accompanied in an inspiring and committed manner by the ensemble La Sfera Armoniosa under the direction of Mike Fentross, which can also show its musical qualities in two orchestral contributions (Ouverture to Susanna and the Symphony from Joseph and his Brethren)... Verhaar is well-known as a concert singer, yet this release is his debut CD. His voice sounds light and soft, his singing is cultivated
Operalounge, 04-6-2024
...Verhaar's stage presence operates best in smaller, profound moments, meaning that many of these arias are a happy match. (...) Supporting the whole project is some really beautiful instrumental playing: listen especially for the thrilling continuo team. Warmly recommended.
Gramophone, 01-6-2024
Under the title "Freedom", the countertenor Oscar Verhaar brings together arias from Handel oratorios on his debut album, in whose Old Testament material the striving for freedom is always opposed to slavery as an antipode. As can be seen from the liner notes Verhaar also sees this area of tension as relevant to the emergence of the Works and thus ties in with current discourses with the aim of stimulating a critical awareness of Georg Friedrich Handel as a beneficiary of British overseas business. Verhaar's slim voice... the recordings consistently demonstrate his vocal agility and a finely differentiated interpretation that is exemplary by the specialist ensemble La Sfera Armoniosa under Mike Fentross.
FAZ, 13-5-2024
Vermaar comes out on top. He has a beautiful, agile voice and expressive, sings naturally, has the gift
of nuance and makes use of his theatrical experience. He is also very well accompanied by La Sfera harmoniosa, Mike Fentross' orchestra (...) All in all, an interesting album of a voice whose trajectory will have to be followed in
the future.
Scherzo, 01-5-2024
The Dutch countertenor Oscar Verhaar brings quite a depth of expression to Handel's biblical freedom arias. Every friction is savored.
Radio Klassik Stephansdom, 18-4-2024
nothing but praise ...for his slender, melodious, luminous and virtuosic voice, which is also lyrically well directed and outstanding in terms of drama and affetto (...) The orchestra La Sfera Armoniosa, conducted by Mike Fentross, also deserves much praise.
Pizzicato, 11-4-2024
Ten years after his debut album, Dutch countertenor Oscar Verhaar releases his second CD. Accompanied by the baroque ensemble La Sfera Armoniosa, he showcases his agile, clear voice in arias from Georg Friedrich Handel's biblical oratorios.
Conductor Mike Fentross monitors the balance between soloist and ensemble and folds the accompaniment around Verhaar's voice with subtle dynamics.
De Volkskrant, 04-4-2024
Oscar Verhaar's voice appears lightweight, well-led with an effortless approach, bright and clear, quite agile, clear and enjoys coloratura".[...]
This orchestra called "La Sfera Armoniosa" under Mike Fentross accompanies confidently, stylishly, lively and finding the right tone for all singing temperaments.
Klassik Heute, 02-4-2024
Eight arias from very different oratorios, namely Deborah, Samson, Alexander Balus, Belshazzar, Joseph and his Brethren, Saul and Jephta, show us a brilliant singer whose voice always sounds soft and yet assertive, regardless of whether it is an energetic recitative, a demanding aria or an elegiac lament works.
Together with the ensemble La Sfera Armoniosa under the direction of the well-known lutenist Mike Fentross, a large and yet increasingly differentiated, transparent overall sound is created.
klemens-berthold.de, 18-3-2024