Album: Ildebrando D'Arcangelo, Handel: Arias (Deutsche Grammophon)

Bass-baritone singers are generally deprived of the starring roles accorded their tenor colleagues.

But "Brando" has enough of his namesake's smouldering good looks to make his mark with this debut solo anthology of Handel arias. Set to the period arrangements of Modo Antiquo, it's imposing stuff, with arias from Agrippina, Orlando and Rodelinda, a pair from Ariodante switching between wretched grief and exultant joy, and elsewhere a selection of hissing snakes, evil, darkness and terror, all wielded with an elegant grace occasionally bordering on the humorously knowing.

Download this: Ombra mai fu, Lo di Roma il Giove sono, Invida sorte