The French tenor, Cyrille Dubois, returns to his favourite period in music: Baroque. Pursuing his mission as a trailblazer, he has teamed up with the Hungarian conductor György Vashegyi and the Centre de musique baroque de Versailles to create a recital aimed at reviving little-known treasures of the 18th-century French operatic repertoire – several of the pieces are recorded here for the first time.

Focussing on haute-contre roles – the haute-contre voice being the ancestor of the leggero tenor, or ténor léger – the programme includes some fine excerpts from operas by Rameau, together with some equally beautiful arias and choruses by composers such as Dauvergne and Mondonville, but also Iso, Royer, Berton, and others.

Cyrille Dubois is magnificent as Tarsis (in Tarsis et Zélie by Francoeur and Rebel), flamboyant as Agénor (in Les Caractères de la Folie by Bernard de Bury) and extremely moving as Céphale (in L’Aurore et Céphale by Francoeur).

This recital provides a full picture of the Baroque hero – sometimes tender and amorous, sometimes fiery or triumphant – who receives here one of the finest interpretations.