The original (piano and voice) Mussorgsky Songs and Dances of Death

[Mandryka]

I start with a recommendation and a question.

Recommendation.





What Mikhail Svetlov has made me see is how varied the settings are is in terms of expression.


Question

Does anyone have  Ghiaurov/Dokovska? How is it?

[Mandryka]

A calm vocal rendition by Gerald Finley. What I mean is that it's not melodramatic in its expression, and it's sung like lieder rather than declaimed. Quite sensitive to the irony in the music, it's not all doom and gloom. The result of this phlegmatic approach is somehow even more disturbing.

[Mandryka]

Really inhabited - deeply felt - account, and that goes for both Vishnevskaya and Rostropovich. Extraordinary vocal colours, astonishing in Trepak. Of course you have to like her distinctive voice but still, it's one to hear.