Description on Youtube:
As if the preceding piece, from Gretry's "L'amant", wasn't lightweight enough, this aria, though dealing with a tragic situation, as a young favorite of the Queen (Marguerite de Valois), Isabelle (soprano), remembers the happier times of her childhood, before she became a member of the monarch's court, is even more fluffy but still very much delightful.
The structure is Italian, representing the usual cantabile - tempo di mezzo - cabaletta structure so often found in the belcanto school, though it this case the piece is opened with a long and quite effective solo violin solo which appears throughout the aria as an obbligato instrument. The andante, in ABA form, is not particularly noteworthy, amounting pretty much to a lovely but not particularly memorable melody. The reverse case comes in the cabaletta that follows it after a short transitional passage: the music is catchy and very much enjoyable (and involving a particularly large quantity of ornamental garnishes the number of which is even higher in the final coda) but it is completely out of sync with the text which actually has Isabelle praying to God to help her pass unharmed among all the courtiers' intrigues. Still, the aria represents a perfectly winning, if not particularly inspired, number.
Sumi Jo offers quite an appealing Isabelle in this short except. Hope you'll enjoy.
