• AMINTA  Philippa Hyde soprano
• ELISA  Rebecca Bottone soprano
• TAMIRI  Anna Leese soprano
• ALESSANDRO  Nicholas Hurndall Smith tenor
• AGENORE  Tom Raskin tenor
• Essex Baroque Orchestra
• directed by Steven Devine

Il rè pastore is the last and greatest of Mozart’s youthful operas. It was written for a visit of the Archduke Maximilian Franz to Salzburg in March 1775, and is a shortened setting of a famous libretto by the Viennese court poet Pietro Metastasio, also set by Hasse, Gluck, Jommelli and others.

It concerns the shepherd Aminta, unwillingly placed on the throne of Sidon by Alexander the Great. Aminta has eyes only for his beloved Elisa, though misunderstandings and intrigues involving Aegenore, a nobleman of Sidon, and Tamiri, a refugee princess, keep them apart. Eventually all is resolved with a double wedding. Mozart’s lively and brilliant setting was written as a serenata, to be performed with a minimum of action and scenery, and relies a good deal on virtuoso singing and colourful orchestration.

Il rè pastore is rarely performed today, though it contains a good deal of beautiful music, and it was evidently highly thought of by its composer, who sent a copy of the score to his friend Joseph Myslivecek in 1777 and converted the overture into a symphony the following year.