Concerto for Oboe g-moll HWV 297
Geloso Tormento - aria from Almira
Almira Suite
Vedrai s'a tuo dispetto - aria from Almira
Oboe Sonata c-moll HWV 366
Qui l'aguel - aria from Aci, Galatea e Polifemo
Concerto doppio for oboe, bassoon, strings and b.c.
Trio Sonata B Dur HWV 388
Ouverture from Teseo (Dresdner Version)
Moriro, ma vendicata - aria from Teseo

"I wrote like the devil in those days, especially for the hautbois, which was my favourite instrument", Georg Friedrich Handel reminisced on his youthful years. Throughout his life, the oboe was to play an outstanding role for him; for no other instrument did he compose such passionate, dramatic and virtuosic soli. The Batzdorfer Hofkapelle presents here a selection of the most beautiful works of Handel with the oboe – beginning with the early Hamburg period and his sojourn in Rome and concluding with his London period. The recording includes excerpts from the operas Almira, HWV 1 and Teseo, HWV 9, from the latter the vengeance aria Moriro, ma vendicata with its maniacal coloraturas in both the singing voice and the oboe. In the instrumental works recorded here, the spectrum extends from oboe sonatas and trio sonatas to concertos.

The oboist Xenia Löffler, member of the Berlin Academy of Early Music, is an internationally sought-after soloist. She proves herself on this recording to be a top-notch Handel specialist who knows how to perform both the lyrical and the dramatic moments of this music with elegance and verve. The vocal parts in the arias with oboe are sung by the young coloratura soprano Marie Friederike Schöder, a shooting star of the baroque scene whose voice convinces listeners with its extraordinary fluency and lightness in the high range.