Here's something unusual for your collection - and good music too. The plot of the opera is taken from Ovid s Metamorphoses, telling the story of the sculptor Pygmalion, who falls in love with his own creation, the statue of a beautiful woman.
Divine intervention leads to the statue being brought to life and to a happy ending.
The repeated notes in the fast section of the overture represent the tapping of the sculptor s chisel. I recorded the piece from a live concert on BBC Radio 3 by La Petite Bande conducted by Gustav Leonhardt. I wanted to play it, but couldn't find a published score, so I ended up with the laborious task of transcribing it from the tape. I had to arrange it for the available performers, but fortunately this is not too far removed from the original orchestration. I only had 1 oboe and had to give the 2nd oboe part to a violinist, and I had to add in a french horn part.