What Opera Are You Listening to Now?

[Tsaraslondon]

Very interesting guys and thanks for the recommendations. I haven't heard all of them and am now interested in a few. But surely there must be some Handel to add!?!?!?!   I am not as enthusiastic about Handel compared to others, but I did really like what she was singing here. I thought the quick throw away comment about what life would have been like to stay as a contralto was quite 'her'.

The first recording I ever bought of hers was the first disc of the Hyperion Schubert edition. Great stuff (and boy were they lucky to get her)!

She recorded a superb Handel Arias collection for Philips under Leppard, as well as a complete Ariodante,and she is the mezzo soloist on Mackerras's EMI recording of Messiah, one of the first to make a nod in the direction of HIP performance, though it seems quite old fashioned now, I suppose. She is also on Mackerras's DG recording of Judas Maccabeus.

Then there is her Julius Caesar for ENO, captured both in sound and on Video.

All worth investigating.

[knight66]

Very interesting guys and thanks for the recommendations. I haven't heard all of them and am now interested in a few. But surely there must be some Handel to add!?!?!?!   I am not as enthusiastic about Handel compared to others, but I did really like what she was singing here. I thought the quick throw away comment about what life would have been like to stay as a contralto was quite 'her'.

The first recording I ever bought of hers was the first disc of the Hyperion Schubert edition. Great stuff (and boy were they lucky to get her)!

I thoroughly recommend this double CD: _{https://www.amazon.com/Bach-Handel-Cantatas-Vocal-Works/dp/B00005B5NN/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=Janet+baker+handel+bach&qid=1555863204&s=music&sr=1-3-spell}


Bach and Handel, whole cantatas, arias from cantatas and a dramatic scena.

I also bought the Hyperion Schubert disc as soon as it appeared, such great linear notes with that series. And I agree, they were lucky to get her. Much earlier she produced an LP set of Schubert songs accompanied by Gerald Moore, another collaborator who mentored her and grew to thoroughly appreciate her.

Mike

[knight66]

Of course, I have thought of another Baker disc that I urge folk to explore, and it is an opera.

Holst Savitri: A short chamber opera for three singers. This has a really beautiful and haunting score. I saw Baker in it and Dido and Aeneas was paired with it.

This kind of music plays to Baker's gifts and the piece provides lots of long melodic lines, soft singing and passion. The husband dies early on and Savitri makes efforts with Death to return him to her. The recording is conducted by Holst's daughter, Imogen. Robert Tear is the husband and Thomas Hemsley is Death.

Mike

[Biffo]

Monteverdi: L'incoronazione di Poppea - Gabriel Garrido conducting Ensemble Elyma, Coro Antonio Il Verso & soloists. Completing an interrupted listening from yesterday. Generally well played and sung but lacking characterisation at times, probably because I am used to Harnoncourt and his more incisive style and flamboyant singers. Flavio Oliver as Nerone is the pick of the singers. Guilemette Laurens (who sings Nerone for Jacobs) has too much vibrato for my taste. Garrido uses a very full edition and it clocks in at around 3h 40m.

[Tsaraslondon]

Monteverdi: L'incoronazione di Poppea - Gabriel Garrido conducting Ensemble Elyma, Coro Antonio Il Verso & soloists. Completing an interrupted listening from yesterday. Generally well played and sung but lacking characterisation at times, probably because I am used to Harnoncourt and his more incisive style and flamboyant singers. Flavio Oliver as Nerone is the pick of the singers. Guilemette Laurens (who sings Nerone for Jacobs) has too much vibrato for my taste. Garrido uses a very full edition and it clocks in at around 3h 40m.

Have you heard the Claudio Cavina recording of the Naples version. Well worth seeking out. None of the singers is particularly well known, but all are excellent, especially the sexily scheming Poppea of Emanuela Galli.

[Biffo]

Have you heard the Claudio Cavina recording of the Naples version. Well worth seeking out. None of the singers is particularly well known, but all are excellent, especially the sexily scheming Poppea of Emanuela Galli.

I haven't heard this one. Not sure I want another version but it is interesting that it is the Naples version - most of the recordings I have come across are either conflations of Venice and Naples or give no indication what is being used.

[Tsaraslondon]

When it comes to a studio set of Norma, I find it very hard to make a choice between the two Callas recordings. I have a great deal of affection for the 1960 set, as it was the first complete opera set I owned. Callas's voice has deteriorated, it is true, but not so disastrously as people often think, and she is surrounded by a better cast; Corelli a vast improvement on the crude and unstylish Fillipeschi, Ludwig a younger sounding Adalgisa than Stignani, who, quite frankly, sounds plain matronly (she was 51 at the time of the recording). Zaccaria a more buttery toned Oroveso too, though Rossi-Lemeni is a more authorative presence. The second recording is also in stereo, so in much better sound. That said, Callas herself is in much more secure voice in this earlier set. Admittedly the characterisation has become even more subtly drawn by the time of the second recording (how much this had to do with  failing resources and how much with deepened understanding is a moot point), but we do lose some of Norma's heroic dimension.

I'd have to say I am torn between the two. I treasure the second recording for the beauty of her mezza voce singing in the middle voice, where sometimes phrases are almost more felt than sung (surprsingly, she blends better with Ludwig too) but we do miss the security on high.

If forced to choose just one of Callas's recordings of Norma, I would undoubtedly go for the live 1955 La Scala account, with Simionato, Del Monaco and Zaccaria, and particularly in its Divina Records transfer, which, apart from some radio interference at the beginning of Act II, is pretty good. However, as I would also want a studio recording of the opera, then I suppose I would just have to have both.

[André]

JPC has an opera sets sale going on, some 150 new entries.

No bargain basement deals, but very decent prices none the less. Time to plug a few holes...


https://www.jpc.de/jpcng/classic/offers

List sorted by ascending prices.

[Tsaraslondon]

This recording was taped at a performance n Munich in March 1965. It was a new production by August Everding, and, judging by the audience reaction, it was a tremendous success.

Teresa Stratas's shattering Violetta  is of course well known from the Zeffirelli film, brilliantly acted, if vocally stressed. Here she is  just a few months short of her twenty-seventh birthday and making her debut in the role, and, if the photos in the booklet are anything to go by, lshe ooked absolutely stunning. Vocally though, and divorced from her powerful stage presence, she has her problems, especially in the first act. She has to transpose down Sempre libera and, even then, it taxes her to the limit. There are other places too where her voice doesn't quite do what she wants it to, though, in intention at least, it has the seeds of a great performance. For instance the moments leading up to Violetta's outpouring of love at Amami, Alfredo are urgently and sincerely felt, but she can't quite swell the tone at Amami, Alfredo itself. In the last act she delivers a telling letter reading and a moving Addio del passato, but the performance doesn't yet add up to a complete whole.

No challenge then for Callas, whose Violetta is hors councours, and whose 1958 Covent Garden performance remains my all time favourite. In Zeffirelli's film, though vocally not much more comfortable, Stratas surpasses what she does here, where we are also able to see her touchingly vulnerable acting.

Hermann Prey, 36 at the time and only a year older than Wunderlich, sounds too young and tends to oversing, possibly in an attempt to sound more Italianate. Though there is pleasure to be derived from the voice itself, I don't get any sense of a real character.

No, the chief reason for hearing this set is the chance to hear Wunderlich sing a complete role in Italian. The Language suits him well and he is an ardently lyrical Alfredo, singing with honeyed tone, but with plenty of heft in the outburst at Flora's party. Very very occasionally he overplays his hand (mostly in recitative) but there is much that is treasurable; Dei miei bollenti spiriti has a lovely lilt and he and Stratas make a wonderfully touching moment out of tha brief moment of happiness, Parigi, o cara. Later perhaps he would have played down slightly the histrionics in his contribution to Gran Dio, morir si giovane, but it is already a treasurable performance and reason enough to hear this live recording.

[pjme]

For Honegger's Antigone one needs to be prepared: libretto in hand & doors closed. It helps, I fear, to read french. Cocteau's  words are quite bare: there's no idle chatter and Honegger pushes these 50 minutes unrelentlessly forward with driving yet stuttering rythms. It must be a very difficult score to sing and conduct, as so many small parts have to fit perfectly in the general canvas.
This 1960 live performance has at least 4 superb stalwarts in Geneviève Serres, Claudine Verneuil, Janine Collard and Jean Giraudeau who master those tricky lines and rythmic complexities. Maurice Le Roux leads the French National Orchestra and ORTF chorus. There's real commitment here and it is good to hear the enthusiastic applause from the public.
The sound is quite boxy and brass and sax solos sound a bit awkward to me (the venue is not specified).

[ritter]

For Honegger's Antigone one needs to be prepared: libretto in hand & doors closed. It helps, I fear, to read french. Cocteau's  words are quite bare: there's no idle chatter and Honegger pushes these 50 minutes unrelentlessly forward with driving yet stuttering rythms. It must be a very difficult score to sing and conduct, as so many small parts have to fit perfectly in the general canvas.
This 1960 live performance has at least 4 superb stalwarts in Geneviève Serres, Claudine Verneuil, Janine Collard and Jean Giraudeau who master those tricky lines and rythmic complexities. Maurice Le Roux leads the French National Orchestra and ORTF chorus. There's real commitment here and it is good to hear the enthusiastic applause from the public.
The sound is quite boxy and brass and sax solos sound a bit awkward to me (the venue is not specified).

That's the most expensive CD I've ever bought  . I missed it when it first came out (at Rose Records in Chicago in the 80s) and never saw it again until a couple of years ago in a B&M shop here in Madrid (a sealed copy, and the owner of the store knew how rare it was   ). Me being an admirer—with reservations—of both Honegger and Cocteau, I needed to know the piece, but unfortunately wasn't all that impressed by it. You've given me a cue to revisit it, pjme, and see if my investment does in the end pay off  .

Cheers,

[pjme]

Hmm, I was lucky then: I bought it for 2 or 3 € when one of Antwerp's last classical CD shops closed.

And, yes do try it again. This may be not "pleasant" music, but I do enjoy it once in a while.
I can easily imagine this Antigone being given in a cracking contemporary version with video, digital effects, a really "cool" direction. But the singers must be real linguistic virtuosi!
Combine it with another short opera and I will buy the ticket.

[Florestan]

Earlier today, this\:

https://www.youtube.com/v/YoprpgIY1Yw&t=2204s

Didn't like the setting at all --- although per Bacco!, Olga Peretyatko in negligee is not at all negligible...

But the music and the singing is simply glorious! I don't need no libretto (my Italian is serviceable enough) nor any closed doors (were there any in the opera house back then?) to be amused by, and have fun with, this farsa comica in one act. Nothing profound, of course: no earth-shattering spiritual revelation, nor any yet unheard of insight into the human condition --- just good clean fun, quid pro quo comedy --- and the sparkling, witty, toe-tapping, ebullient, yet at times most tender and heartwrenching, music of Rossini.

In the end, I was reminded of Stendhal's dictum that if music cannot reach the spiritual heights of Mozart and Beethoven, then it must at least entertain and amuse us and made us forget our daily cares even for a few hours, and if it succeeded then it would be no small achievement --- and I say: Amen!

[Tsaraslondon]

Davis's classic recording of La Damnation de Faust, better cast I think than his later LSO Live version, is still one of the most recommendable versions of Berlioz's non-opera.

Gedda may have been just a little past his vocal best but he still manages a gorgeous pianissimo top C sharp in the duet with Marguerite, which no other Faust can quite pull off, added to which his singing is always stylish and intelligently thought through. He is a great Faust. There are better Margeurite's on disc than Veasey (Baker, Von Stade and Von Otter come to mind); the difficult Roi de Thulé doesn't quite come off, but she is better in the duet and sings a fine Romance. Bastin makes a superb Méphistophélès, mercurial, sardonic and ultimately evil and Richard Van Allan puts in one of his best recorded performances as Brander.

Davis, as so often in Berlioz, has a wonderful sense of structure and paces the score just right, and the LSO play brilliantly for him, the brass powerful, woodwind and strings deliciously light in the Menuet des Follets, plus some wonderfully sensitive cor anglais playing in the introduction to D'amour l'ardente flamme.

Every time I listen to this piece, I am struck by its originality. Berlioz was and is unique, with an unmistakable voice. No other composer is remotely like him.

[André]

Well put. When it's all said and done, this Philips set is still the one to go for. I have huge affection for some others (Monteux, Markevitch), and nobody has sung D'Amour, l'ardente flamme as Callas did. But I still return to the Davis set for its overall excellence.

[Tsaraslondon]

Well put. When it's all said and done, this Philips set is still the one to go for. I have huge affection for some others (Monteux, Markevitch), and nobody has sung D'Amour, l'ardente flamme as Callas did. But I still return to the Davis set for its overall excellence.

Callas is hors concours. How I wish she'd sung more Berlioz. What a wonderful Didon or Cassandre she would have been! And why not a Nuits d'Eté? That said Shirley Verrett comes a close second on a recital disc of hers, recorded in 1967.

[André]

Speaking of Verrett, I listened to this version of Carmen this week:



A strange production. Dated 12/14/1967, it presents a commercial broadcast from the RAI. The sound is distant and variable, but still listenable. We get a narrator briefly setting the scene (« Une manufacture de tabac sur la Place de Séville »). Strangely, the narrator and the character's dialogues are heard from a totally different perspective, obviously from a studio and very close to the microphones. The two principals are anglophones but have a very good, if scholarly diction. Lance in particular speaks slowly, detaches every syllable and sounds almost childish in his enunciation of the text. He made me think of Dr Shawn Murphy in The Good Doctor series. With its narrator and studio dialogues I had a feeling of listening to Carmen for Dummies. It was strangely effective.

Excellent singing, with Verrett particularly refulgent on top. You rarely hear such uninhibitedly big, luscious high notes. This is singing on the grand scale, but it is still vivacious. Lance is his usual self, with pinging tones and a good legato. La Scala tried to lure him away from the Paris Opera, but he remained faithful to the Hexagon. He received his French Citizenship from De Gaulle himself in 1967. Massard is a very good Escamillo, agile in his couplets, the voice firm yet free on top.

An interesting set.

[Tsaraslondon]

How I wish Verrett had made a studio recording of Carmen.

Bunbry did of course, but she's unaccountably dull in the Fruhbeck de Burgos recording.

[ritter]

Cropssposted from the WAYLTN thread:

First listen to this vintage recording of Die Meistersinger (Act I only today):

[asin]B01MDP6H5E[/asin]
This is quite outstanding, by far the best I've ever listened to by  Hans Knappertsbusch; detailed phrasing, clarity of textures (which highlights the contrapuntal richness of this dazzling score), and great singing from all soloists (with particular attention to the diction--every word is understood!). A great recording.

[Jaakko Keskinen]