Margret Köll, Opera on harp: the favorite arias of Christina van Zweden

A queen lays down her crown. Clad in men's clothes, she begins a quest across land and sea, in search of art, music, and herself. Christina van Zweden is born exactly 400 years ago as the only legitimate heir of Gustav II Adolf, who dies before her sixth birthday. She grows up as a fickle language prodigy with a hunger for books, religion, alchemy, and science. She wants to make Stockholm the Athens of the North. In 1654, she does something unseen: she abdicates and converts to Catholicism. Harpiste Margret Köll follows Christina's journey in music: from the Baltic Sea via Innsbruck, where Cesti's opera L'Argia celebrated her conversion, to Rome – her self-chosen place of exile. There she becomes a source of inspiration for opera composers like Marazzoli and Rossi. Don't expect average arias: Köll rearranges monumental stage works into music tailored to a single instrument. Voice, scene, and orchestra become stilled opera that blooms wonderfully on the arpa doppia a tre registri and the Welsh triple harp.