As late as the end of the 18th century, one writer put the Neapolitan composer Francesco Feo on a level with Bach and Handel, but, in line with the general neglect of composers from Naples (a bigger city than Rome or Venice in the middle 18th century), he is hardly known today. The Italian violinist and conductor Fabio Biondi and composer/musicologist Manuel de Roo have done a good deal of work producing a performable score of this 1734 oratorio, San Francesco di Sales, and the results are well worth checking out for lovers ...
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As late as the end of the 18th century, one writer put the Neapolitan composer Francesco Feo on a level with Bach and Handel, but, in line with the general neglect of composers from Naples (a bigger city than Rome or Venice in the middle 18th century), he is hardly known today. The Italian violinist and conductor Fabio Biondi and composer/musicologist Manuel de Roo have done a good deal of work producing a performable score of this 1734 oratorio, San Francesco di Sales, and the results are well worth checking out for lovers of the transitional late Baroque. There are several strong points here, first among them the application of the influential light Neapolitan style to a sacred subject. The effect is a bit incongruous but bright and charming, especially inasmuch as the opera does not really dramatize the life of the titular saint but rather presents him in dialogues with allegorical figures like Heresy. This works in a kind of pastoral-like way, and Feo's music, for the mid-1730s, was absolutely...
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