Recordings That You Are Considering

[Daverz]

I am interested in the Magnus Lindberg box that you mention...do you have any more info on it?  Is it distinct from this one:

[asin]B004KDO31A[/asin]

I have this ~brown/white 4cd, which includes the massive "Kraft" from that single Ondine disc you list, but not the "Piano Concerto" (nor, apparently, most of his other concertos....here's hoping those are collected in another set).  I really like his music, but I don't know how much of it you'd need.  I find "Kraft" remarkably powerful, and I've liked almost every other piece from this 4cd as well, about half them I've liked quite well.

That the one I saw.  It's pretty cheap at Amazon.  I have to admit that I have some Lindberg that I don't like much, a DG disc with Aura, which is exactly the kind of big, gestural orchestral work that annoys me.  But I like the Clarinet Concerto.

My n00b opinion on opera is just about worthless, but the Karajan BOHEME you mention is the only one I have, and I love it; I got it as part of that funnily-titled DEFINITIVE COLLECTION Puccini box (blood-red satin!) simply because opera veteran friends kept mentioning the performances included in that set, and because I found a good deal on it....and it has paper librettos included, *gasp*.  Naturally I will be getting that legendary Beecham eventually, though; probably in the Naxos Historical edition.

I'll check out this box, thanks.

[NJ Joe]

I recall that one being a good one, Joe, but it's been years since I listened to it. Sleeping Beauty is my favorite Tchaikovsky ballet.

Hello MI (for short),

Care to make any recommendations?

[Mandryka]

Wish list backlog:


[asin]B0000041TD[/asin]

I love this performance. I'm a great fan of Pavarotti and of Freni, and Karajan is outstanding in Puccini I think. It's really dramatic in the crowd scene and the Rodolfo/Marcello duet in Act 3 is extremely moving. Sound is pretty good too.

I once heard Freni talk about performing it with Pavarotti, she talked about how they boh relished the opera, how they both loved performing it together, how she felt as though there was a real bond between them when they were singing it together.

[Octave]

re: Puccini DEFINITIVE COLLECTION (red Decca box):

I'll check out this box, thanks.

Do make sure to check around about the other operas in that, Daverz; my sources coincided in recommending them, but I have no alternative points of comparison at all.  It is my Puccini Desert Island, by default!

[kishnevi]

Me too. 

But I am thinking it is time for me to invest in another recording of more recent vintage.  I am thinking of one of these, or maybe both.
[asin]B0017LU05G[/asin]

I already have half a dozen, maybe more, recordings of this, but they are from the '70s and before.  These two are at least within the last decade or so.

Any really new recordings of this great work that are worth checking out?

I have the Villazon-Netrebko recording.  It's good enough to have kept me from wanting to get another  recording (although I did get the Bernstein recording along the way),  but not good enough to erase performances from the 70s I heard on Met broadcasts and tours.

Of course, when it comes to Boheme, I am easily pleased.

You might actually want to get the DVD version, which is (going by the clip I've seen from it) an actual film and not a theatrical production filmed during performance.

[asin]B002Q9MZF6[/asin]

[kishnevi]

I may just buy the DVDs since both of these Bohemes are on Spotify.  There is also a recent Gheorghiu Tosca from Covent Garden (2011) that looks to be very good as well.

[asin]B008K7RGA2[/asin]

It has been a long time since I spent any  money on La Boheme and Tosca and probably a new La Traviata, I may be in for a bit of a splurge in the opera area.

The bit of Netrebko's Salzburg Traviata I've seen (two clips included in her CD of Traviata highlights) seemed rather good.

But again, in Traviata I'm easily satisfied.   In fact, in most Puccini and not-late Verdi I'm easily satisfied.  (Not-late Verdi meaning up to and including Aida. Otello and Falstaff seem to involve me intellectually and emotionally far more than any of his other operas.)

[Gurn Blanston]

Well, here is something I find tremendously irritating;

Brilliant released the Clementi sonatas in boxes of 3 disks each over a 3-4 year period. I obtained the first 5 boxes or 15 disks. I've been waiting for the 6th and final box for nearly 2 years now, and then today on amazon, I find this on offer:

[asin]B008GAXUW6[/asin]

So now, to get the final 3 disks, I have to buy the first 15 over again. Unless, of course, Volume 6 was released somewhere in the world with no fanfare whatsoever and exists.  Needless to say, I find this to be foul play...   

[Sergeant Rock]

Well, here is something I find tremendously irritating;

Brilliant released the Clementi sonatas in boxes of 3 disks each over a 3-4 year period. I obtained the first 5 boxes or 15 disks. I've been waiting for the 6th and final box for nearly 2 years now, and then today on amazon, I find this on offer:

[asin]B008GAXUW6[/asin]

So now, to get the final 3 disks, I have to buy the first 15 over again. Unless, of course, Volume 6 was released somewhere in the world with no fanfare whatsoever and exists.  Needless to say, I find this to be foul play...   

Is this what you are looking for?

Sarge

[mc ukrneal]

Is this what you are looking for?

Sarge

Errr...ummm....or this?

[asin]B009TBNXD2[/asin]
Just over $12 from the Classical Music Store (incl shipping)....

[Gurn Blanston]

Is this what you are looking for?

Sarge

I don't know, Sarge, it's all in German...    Anyway, yes that looks like the one. I got the other 5 in England, since only a couple of volumes eventually came available in the States. But they have never shown to have Vol 6. Anyway, thanks, I know now it's out there, I can find it maybe a little closer to home. 

[Gurn Blanston]

Errr...ummm....or this?

[asin]B009TBNXD2[/asin]
Just over $12 from the Classical Music Store (incl shipping)....

Interesting, after I found the entire box I did a search for this and only came up with Vol. 3 & 5...   

OK, maybe I'm not as irked now as I once was. It's been a long week.

Thanks,

[mc ukrneal]

Interesting, after I found the entire box I did a search for this and only came up with Vol. 3 & 5...   

OK, maybe I'm not as irked now as I once was. It's been a long week.

Thanks,

A nice price helps keep things happy! I just entered Clementi and the last name of the pianist (hard to spell I might add) and it came up first for me.

[Gurn Blanston]

A nice price helps keep things happy! I just entered Clementi and the last name of the pianist (hard to spell I might add) and it came up first for me.

Indeed. This is a nice set BTW, I have got a good deal of pleasure from the first 5 volumes. Mastroprimiano is nicely expressive, and plays a great sounding pianoforte too. Clementi is probably the finest composer for the keyboard that most people have never heard. So, a good argument to try out a box.

[Todd]

[asin]B0017LU05G[/asin]

I had this set for a while.  No reason to keep it with Beecham and Karajan in my collection.

[mc ukrneal]

Indeed. This is a nice set BTW, I have got a good deal of pleasure from the first 5 volumes. Mastroprimiano is nicely expressive, and plays a great sounding pianoforte too. Clementi is probably the finest composer for the keyboard that most people have never heard. So, a good argument to try out a box.

I've collected the set on a modern piano (Hyperion) and been very pleased. I wonder why they both came out around the same time.

[Gurn Blanston]

I've collected the set on a modern piano (Hyperion) and been very pleased. I wonder why they both came out around the same time.

Oh, something for everyone, I suppose. Or to collect as much as possible from Sonic Dave, who is getting them both.   

[Mandryka]

Are there any recordings with Caruso singing from La Boheme, acompanied by Puccini?

Are there any post-postmodernist regietheatre productions of it on 3D blu-ray?

I can sense I'm going to ho on a  little Puccini binge.

[Daverz]

Are there any post-postmodernist regietheatre productions of it on 3D blu-ray?

The Villazon below is not regietheatre, if it's the one I saw on PBS, and MDT lists a blu-ray (among 7 other blu-ray discs).  I didn't last 15 mintues, because it's one of those lip-synched filmed operas with lots of close ups that I find annoying.  I want a theatrical experience, even on video.

[Mandryka]

The Villazon below is not regietheatre, if it's the one I saw on PBS, and MDT lists a blu-ray (among 7 other blu-ray discs).  I didn't last 15 mintues, because it's one of those lip-synched filmed operas with lots of close ups that I find annoying.  I want a theatrical experience, even on video.

I saw Villazon sing it at Covent Garden, with Georgiou. It was his premier in Boheme there. He'd previously sung in Tales of Hoffman at the Opera House before that, and he had impressed everyone who had seen it, but really he was an unknown.

It was one of the best nights at the opera I've ever experienced. Villazon upstaged Georgiou, and you could see that she herself was taken aback by the intensity of his singing. At applause time, her body language showed she didn't like being upstaged at all.

Villazon was my great hope for a tenor of the stature of Vickers and Pavarotti. His Don Carlos and Hoffman and Rodolfo live and even his Monteverdi were amazing.

Then I lost interest in opera a bit, stopped going to Covent Garden and I didn't follow what he's done.

[Opus106]

I've been waiting for the 6th and final box for nearly 2 years now, and then today on amazon, I find this on offer:

Unless, of course, Volume 6 was released somewhere in the world with no fanfare whatsoever and exists.  Needless to say, I find this to be foul play...   

Interesting, after I found the entire box I did a search for this and only came up with Vol. 3 & 5...   

Might I suggest, when you get a break from having your nose deep in Haydn biographies and related material* , you use Presto to get a list of volumes from a series?

For instance: http://www.prestoclassical.co.uk/s/Mastroprimiano%2BComplete%2BClementi%2BPiano%2BSonatas

Any volume which is part of a series, assuming it's labelled as such, will link you to a page with a complete listing.




*Not complaining