What opera have you been listening to, lately?

[Dark_Angel]

I pulled another out of the Callas remasters box:

Attachment 6000

Glorious recording and clear as a bell! All the voices were recorded at what must be close to their peak years: Callas, of course, and
Di Stefano and Gobbi. Really wonderful.

The first studio recording Callas made after signing EMI contract in 1953, the label dominance meant a great cast could be arranged to support her and so began the string of many great Callas - Stephano - Gobbi recordings that are priceless today.......

The stylistic change over previous singers Lucia recordings could not be greater, instead of a light toned songbird chirping away Callas gives us a tortured Lucia swept away by maddening emotion, we look into the broken heart of Lucia as never before.......brava Maria!

[Clayton]

...I also listened to part of this - the music is wonderful...

Scarlatti's Griselda has so much beautiful romanticism I hear the some of Donizetti and Bellini belcanto (or belcantissimo as I read described as recently) that developed over the next hundred years, more so than contemporaries such as Handel or other composers in the interim

[Clayton]

Clayton's post number one thousand, eight hundred and forty-six:

I did not like this opera

it happens...



I reached the end of act one before I switched off. I think this one is for the round filing cabinet.

Though as this is such an amonal

anolam

anom

an unusual event, I think I will let it go as a "I will come back to this another time..." category (though not anytime soon.

[Clayton]

...
If anybody ever asks you what coloratura is just point them to Franco Fagioli on this recording. Virtuosic is an understatement.

Hasse, J A: Siroe re di Persia
Dresden version (1763)
Max Emanuel Cencic (Siroe), Franco Fagioli (Medarse), Julia Lezhneva (Laodice), Juan Sancho (Cosroe), Mary-Ellen Nesi (Emira), Laureen Snouffer (Arasse)
Armonia Atenea
George Petrou
Recorded 21-31 July 2014, Parnassus Hall, Athens



Ha! Now this is an excellent come back to the world of opera!

[Adrian]

Donizetti: Rosmonda d'lnghilterra

Bruce Ford (Enrico II), Nelly Miricioiu (Leonora di Guienna), Renée Fleming (Rosmonda Clifford), Alastair Miles (Clifford), Diana Montague (Arturo)

London Philharmonic Orchestra, Geoffrey Mitchell Choir, David Parry
Opera rara orc13

Now playing.
Bel Canto from the highest order.

[Hoffmann]

Clayton's post number one thousand, eight hundred and forty-six:

I did not like this opera

it happens...



I reached the end of act one before I switched off. I think this one is for the round filing cabinet.

Though as this is such an amonal

anolam

anom

an unusual event, I think I will let it go as a "I will come back to this another time..." category (though not anytime soon.

I think that's the first time I've heard you say you didn't like an opera!

I was thinking the other day that maybe I should start a Hoffmann's "Meh List" - but I probably would find myself drummed out of OL!

[Clayton]

I think that's the first time I've heard you say you didn't like an opera...

It did take until post number 1,846, let's hope it's another couple of thousand until the next.

It was an idea during the proms, I thought I would celebrate all things British

I might as well have deep fried a pizza and have gone to the beach at Southport


>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>


Next; the forgotten opera

(as in I forgot it was in the tea cabinet)

Gounod: Faust
Nicolai Gedda (Faust), Victoria De Los Angeles (Marguerite), Boris Christoff (Mephistopheles), Ernest Blanc (Valentin), Liliane Berton (Siebel), Rita Gorr (Marthe) & Victor Autran (Wagner)
Orchestre et Chœurs du Théâtre National de l’Opéra
André Cluytens
Recorded Sep/Oct 1958 Salle de la Mutualité; Dec 1958 Église Saint-Roch, Paris



I enjoyed this so much more than new MET DVD

[Ann Lander (sospiro)]

Gounod: Faust
Nicolai Gedda (Faust), Victoria De Los Angeles (Marguerite), Boris Christoff (Mephistopheles), Ernest Blanc (Valentin), Liliane Berton (Siebel), Rita Gorr (Marthe) & Victor Autran (Wagner)
Orchestre et Chœurs du Théâtre National de l’Opéra
André Cluytens
Recorded Sep/Oct 1958 Salle de la Mutualité; Dec 1958 Église Saint-Roch, Paris

This is fab!

[Clayton]

This is fab!

Thrilling. Absolutely thrilling. I went around again. and again

Clearly the most exciting performance is given here by Boris Christoff... no it's Victoria de Los Angeles... no it's Nicolai Gedda... no it's Boris Christoff... no it's Victoria de Los Angeles... no it's Nicolai Gedda... no it's Boris Christoff... no it's Victoria de Los Angeles... no it's Nicolai Gedda... no it's Boris Christoff... no it's Victoria de Los Angeles... no it's Nicolai Gedda... no it's Boris Christoff... no it's Victoria de Los Angeles... no it's Nicolai Gedda... no it's Boris Christoff...

[JohnGerald]

My first Faust! Still a winner!

[Soave_Fanciulla]

This is probably my favourite solo album by Ceci. It has a good proportion of slower pieces, including a couple of stunningly beautiful duets between first a flute, and then an oboe, and the singer. She performs the slower arias with great delicacy. Let's hope some dedicated musicologist does serious work on previously unknown composer Raupach, and we get a full recording of one of his surviving operas. He's a winner.

[Amfortas]

Continuing my recent exploration of classic Die Walküre recordings, here's the great Lauritz Melchior in a stirring version of the Act I concluding love scene. Not as well known as the justly celebrated 1935 studio recording with Lotte Lehmann conducted by Bruno Walter, this one is still memorable: part of a February 1941 live Carnegie Hall broadcast with the as-yet-unheralded Helen Traubel, under the skilled baton of Arturo Toscanini.



The accompanying photo, by the way, shows Melchior and his wife on the streets of New York, in a historic meeting with Emanuel List, one of the great Hundings of the era.

[MAuer]

The accompanying photo, by the way, shows Melchior and his wife on the streets of New York, in a historic meeting with Emanuel List, one of the great Hundings of the era.

A bit of word play by Wagner, I think. If Siegmund describes himself as a "Wölfing" -- i.e., the offspring of a wolf, then Hunding is -- loosely translated -- a son of a b-tch.

[Hoffmann]

Continuing my recent exploration of classic Die Walküre recordings, here's the great Lauritz Melchior in a stirring version of the Act I concluding love scene. Not as well known as the justly celebrated 1935 studio recording with Lotte Lehmann conducted by Bruno Walter, this one is still memorable: part of a February 1941 live Carnegie Hall broadcast with the as-yet-unheralded Helen Traubel, under the skilled baton of Arturo Toscanini.



The accompanying photo, by the way, shows Melchior and his wife on the streets of New York, in a historic meeting with Emanuel List, one of the great Hundings of the era.

I don't know, but that looks like a Great Dane - to me...

[Amfortas]

I don't know, but that looks like a Great Dane - to me...

Absolutely! Lauritz Melchior, greatest Danish tenor ever!