What Are Some Lesser-Known Operas You'd Like to Get to Know ON CD?

[listener]

It is indeed an extraordinary title!  I like Spohr's music (he was completely overlooked last year among the Big Boy anniversaries) but I've never heard this at all, and had no idea it existed.

I will eventually find the recording, must be on LP of the Variations on a theme from Alruna WoO.15, probably a Klöcker recital.
FYI the list of Spohr operas is:
Alruna, die Eulenkönigen  c.1808   WoO.49    Overture separately catalogued as op.21
Der Zweikampf mit der Geliebten c.1810   Singspiel
Faust  c.1813, rev.1852   overture =op. 60
Zemire und Azor c.1819-20
Jessonda   c.1823   CD on the Orfeo label
Der Berggeist c.1824  overture = op. 73
Pietro  von Albano  c.1827
Der Alchymist   c.1828-30
Die Kreuzfahrer  c.1843-4

and a 1-act operetta  Die Prüfung  c.1806  overure =op. 15a
and Incidental Music to Macbeth  WoO55, overture = op.75

[Superhorn]

   Chandos has recently issued the first commercial recording of Sir Arthur Sullivan's only full-fledged grand opera, Ivanhoe, based on the famous novel.
   Gilbert did not write the libretto to this, and I can't recall offhand who did.
  I would very much like to hear this.

[False_Dmitry]

   Chandos has recently issued the first commercial recording of Sir Arthur Sullivan's only full-fledged grand opera, Ivanhoe, based on the famous novel.
   Gilbert did not write the libretto to this, and I can't recall offhand who did.
  I would very much like to hear this.

The libretto of IVANHOE was written by Julian Sturgis - a new librettist for Sullivan at the time.  The piece was staged with more-than-usual splendour to mark the opening of d'Oyly Carte's new theatre.  THE TIMES reported on the opening night:

Two questions will inevitably be asked, and will receive, no doubt, different answers from different authorities; will Ivanhoe enhance the composer's reputation and that of English art, and will the work take a place among the classics of dramatic music, and attain a real immortality? To the first an unqualified affirmative may surely be given, for even if it be held to lack the poetic charm and distinction of The Golden Legend, its best portions rise so far above anything else that Sir Arthur Sullivan has given to the world, and have such force and dignity, that it is not difficult to forget the drawbacks which may be found in the want of interest of much of the choral writing, and the brevity of the concerted solo parts. On the second question an opinion can only be formed with difficulty and offered with diffidence. The general structure of the work is a curious example of transition between two opposing systems, each of which in its own day has produced masterpieces of undoubted supremacy. The finest scenes, as, for instance, that in which the great duet occurs, suggest by their continuous and sustained treatment that the composer has adopted the modern methods, and that each scene, if not each act, is regarded as a complete entity; the interest given to his recitatives, and the unmistakable influence of Berlioz and, in lesser degree, Wagner, upon the orchestration and treatment of the themes encourage this view. On the other hand, in many of the scenes, we meet a series of numbers, which only require slightly more conventional development to rank with the set pieces of old-fashioned opera, and this impression is confirmed by the perpetual full closes, most of which are preceded by a pause on an effective note for the voice, and, of course, followed by a break in the continuity of the action. It is curious, too, that no two of the scenes are joined together by music; in one case there is no connexion, even of key, between two adjacent sections of the same act. If, as at present seems most probable, the modern theories of dramatic music should obtain universal acceptance, Ivanhoe will have a struggle for permanent existence, and will stand on the merits of its second act, the, portion which unites grace and strength with continuity of design; of course, if a strong reaction should set in against these theories, the work, as a whole, will be generally considered as a masterpiece of design, as well as a collection of individual beauties.

Sullivan's rehearsal pianist (the conductor was Francois Cellier, and not Sullivan himself) for IVANHOE was a young chap called Henry Wood 

[The new erato]

On a related note, Naxos has just released this:



on the Lorelei legend.

[kishnevi]

On a related note, Naxos has just released this:



on the Lorelei legend.

Launched 1932 Scrapped (as the Ellinis of Chandris Lines) 1987

merely the best known of a group of ships of various sorts that bore the name.
http://www.maritimematters.com/lurline32.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Lurline_(1932)