Monday 18 March 2013, 7.00pm – St George’s Church, Hanover Sq uare, London Classical Opera makes its London Handel Festival début with the UK première of Telemann’s Orpheus. This remarkable but long-forgot ten opera was written in Hamburg in 1726, but the score was only rediscove red in the 1970s. This setting provides an unusual slant to the Orpheus myth, with Orasia, widowed queen of Thrace, jealously causing Eurydice’sdeath only to have her obsessive love spurned by Orpheus. Arias are sung i n German, Italian or French, according to the dramatic context, and the music is astonishingly beautiful and dynamic. Classical Opera enjoys an outstanding reputation and track record for its work in developing top-qual ity young singers, and the cast for Orpheus is headed by two of the compan y’s newest Associate Artists, Scottish soprano Eleanor Dennis and English baritone Jonathan McGovern.