Les Paladins GEORG-FRIEDRICH HAENDEL Cantates & Duos Italiens

In 1760, Rameau composed Les Paladins, a lively, witty and imaginatie comédie lyrique. In taking its name from a work by the greatest French composer of the eighteenth century, Les Paladins its aim: to explore lesser-known works of this operatic repertoire, which it performs in chamber versions. The ensemble has presented L'Europe Galante by Campra at the Festival du Haut-Jura, Iphigénie en Tauride by Desmarest at versailles, La Grotte de Versailles by Lully in Paris (tercentenary of the death of the great French landscape gardener Le Nôtre), as well as Grands Motets by Bernier at the Ambronay Festival and in Geneva, and Cantatas by Bach and Telemann at the Musicales d'Oppède and at the Lourdes Festival. Jérôme Correas and Les Paladins are very interested too in the virtuoso Italian repertoire of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and have performed cantatas and serenades by Handel, Stradella, Cesti, Carissimi and Bononcini at Chartres ("Samedis Musicaux"), Paris (Théâtre Grévin), Ambronay, Saint-Michel-en-Thiérache... The programme presented on this recording has already been given in concert at many festivals.