The 15-year-old Mozart composed Lucio Silla for Milan. Set in Rome in the decades B.C., it concerns the despot Lucio Silla, his love for Giunia and jealousy toward the exiled-but-back-in-town Cecilio, who also loves and is loved by Giunia. The opera ends, after dozens of da capo arias, with Silla renouncing his own dictatorship and offering clemency and good times to all around him, including Cecilio's friend Cinna and his own sister Celia, who loves Cinna. In other words, Silla's sister Celia loves Cecilio's friend, Cinna. See?

This performance, mercifully cut (but not as severely as Harnoncourt's; the only complete performance is part of the Compete Mozart Edition on Philips), was recorded onstage at Brussels' La Monnaie in 1985. It features a good cast and idiomatic, dramatic leadership under Sylvain Cambreling, who is very careful to present the recitatives as if they actually were important. Best among the singers are Lella Cuberli as a lovely, feminine Giunia, with fine control over her role's sometimes cruelly difficult coloratura, Anthony Rolfe Johnson who hisses his way through Silla's early music and melts convincingly toward the end, and Ann Murray as Cecilio, who sings unevenly but with great manliness and style (it's a trouser role).

As mentioned, this was recorded live, and I'd like to know what the stage action was like: it seems as if the characters are always in motion, clop-clopping their way across the stage at various tempos even while singing. At any rate, it's a good performance of a not-good opera, but if you must own a Silla, this one is madly cheaper than the competition--providing you can locate the competition, that is. As mentioned, the Hager (on Philips) is complete (acres of recitative), and it's also well sung, with Julia Varady and Arleen Auger (Cecilio and Giunia) particularly fine. Over to you.

--Robert Levine