First performed in Munich in 1688, Niobe, Regina di Tebe has of late become the best-known work by the once-obscure priest-composer-diplomat Agostino Steffani. It’s an awkward piece in some respects. It deals with the mythical queen of Thebes, whom the gods punished for vanity by killing her children. Steffani, however, is a strict moralist who believes in a divinely appointed universe, and his sympathies lie not with his anti-heroine, whom he portrays as adulterous as well as arrogant, but with her husband, Anfione, who longs to abandon politics for the contemplative life. Erato’s new recording was made in 2013, but derives from a 2011 revival at the Boston Early Music festival. Co-directed by theorbo players Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs, it doesn’t quite have the elan or surety that characterises their more familiar work in the French baroque repertory. Karina Gauvin exudes hauteur as Niobe, opposite Philippe Jaroussky’s elegant, noble Anfione. Listen out for the star turns from Aaron Sheehan, rapturous as Niobe’s would-be lover Clearte, and Jesse Blumberg as the sinister yet meddling sorcerer Poliferno.
