VERDI King of Italian Opera

Started by marvinbrown, April 20, 2007, 12:50:59 PM

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Wendell_E

#360
Quote from: mc ukrneal on February 08, 2012, 12:34:12 PM
Every year, I acquire 1-2 Verdi recordings. Last year I got Jerusalem and La Battaglia di Legnano. This year, I was thinking of getting something more from the core that I do not have. But as is often the case, a few operas have harder decisions than others. Any thoughts on sets?

Aida -
Price/Vickers/Solti - Re-issued again quite cheaply. Do I finally take the plunge - cheap enough (Still have the LPs somewhere, so quite familiar with this one)
What else?

Nabucco -
Gobbi/Souliotis/Gardelli
Cappuccilli/Domingo/Nesterenko/Sinopoli

La Forza del Destino (here's a tough one on disc, all with flaws, but I narrowed it down to two)
Price/Domingo/Levine
Tebaldi/del Monaco/Molinari-Pradelli


For Aida, I like the Muti Tsaraslondon mentions, or Price's second recording, with Domingo, Bumbry, and Milnes, Leinsdorf conducting, on RCA.

For Forza, the Levine, or Gardelli's EMI recording, with Arroyo, Bergonzi, Cappuccilli, and Raimondi.

I'd also be interested in an explanation of that opera seria comment.  Sounds more like grand opera to me.
"Never argue with an idiot. They will drag you down to their level and beat you with experience." ― Mark Twain

knight66

Perhaps I will trip myself up on the opera Seria comment. Especially that extraordinary ensemble in the final act where the graven image bites the dust, it seems to me to have shades of Idomeneo or Gluck. The lines pass between a small number of soloists in a hieratic sounding figuration, then it is passed to the chorus. The music swells and there is a climax. The composition is in blocks and formal, but the effect is striking and dramatic.

The Solti Aida is one of the few instances where Tsaras and I always part company; I would never be without it. I don't like the sound mix of Karajan II. He submerges the singers and I think they sound like they are making a bit of an effort to be heard. Baltsa is excellent, I am less taken by the other singers.

Mike
DavidW: Yeah Mike doesn't get angry, he gets even.
I wasted time: and time wasted me.

Tsaraslondon

Can anyone shed any light on this performance?  The only other excerpt I can find on youtube features Agnes Baltas and Norman in the Agnus Dei. I have no idea who the other soloists were, nor the conductor or venue.

Not normally being a fan of Jessye Norman, particularly when she is singing in the soprano register, I must say I found this very impressive indeed. No, nore than impressive, absolutely thrilling. Not only is her singing admirably secure, but response to the text and the dramatic situation is wonderfully vivid and immediate. Fantastic!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wdG_lTz7zCY





\"A beautiful voice is not enough.\" Maria Callas

Drasko

This is the only mention of Baltsa, Norman and Verdi's Requiem I could find

http://www.jcarreras.de/requiem_r.htm

Norman, Baltsa, Nesterenko & Carreras
Verdi: Messa da Requiem, Munich-- October 9, 1981

Tsaraslondon

Quote from: Drasko on March 23, 2012, 11:03:01 AM
This is the only mention of Baltsa, Norman and Verdi's Requiem I could find

http://www.jcarreras.de/requiem_r.htm

Norman, Baltsa, Nesterenko & Carreras
Verdi: Messa da Requiem, Munich-- October 9, 1981

Thanks. Would love to get hold of a recording. I wonder who the conductor was
\"A beautiful voice is not enough.\" Maria Callas

Drasko

It seems Muti was the conductor with Bavarian Radio Orchestra/Chorus.

I don't speak German but this site seems to be offering bootlegs of some sort (scroll to the bottom)

http://www.euro-opera.de/Baltsa.html#ANCHOR_v


Tsaraslondon

Quote from: Drasko on March 23, 2012, 11:31:23 AM
It seems Muti was the conductor with Bavarian Radio Orchestra/Chorus.

I don't speak German but this site seems to be offering bootlegs of some sort (scroll to the bottom)

http://www.euro-opera.de/Baltsa.html#ANCHOR_v

You are resourecful, Drasko. Thank you
\"A beautiful voice is not enough.\" Maria Callas

Drasko

To be clear, I know absolutely nothing about that site, just googled it right now.

knight66

There is an Abbado Verdi Requiem DVD with Margaret Price and Norman is the alto in it and very fine.

Mike
DavidW: Yeah Mike doesn't get angry, he gets even.
I wasted time: and time wasted me.

nico1616

Quote from: mc ukrneal on February 08, 2012, 12:34:12 PM
Every year, I acquire 1-2 Verdi recordings. Last year I got Jerusalem and La Battaglia di Legnano. This year, I was thinking of getting something more from the core that I do not have. But as is often the case, a few operas have harder decisions than others. Any thoughts on sets?

Aida -
Price/Vickers/Solti - Re-issued again quite cheaply. Do I finally take the plunge - cheap enough (Still have the LPs somewhere, so quite familiar with this one)
What else?

If I would choose one Verdi recording from my collection, I would pick this Aida. Solti may be a little bombastic, but what passion!
Leontyne Price owns the title role. She is a vocal actress that has no equal here, and I can easily relate to Aida's suffering when she sings. When Tebaldi or Caballé sings, I hear a golden voice, but no Etheopian slave.

However, in the last act, Price is almost overshadowed by Rita Gorr. Every other Amneris I have heard, is a deception after hearing Gorr. This is her role of a lifetime, from her cunning entry to the moment when she sings 'Anatema su voi', at that moment the sky just collapses. The first scene of act 4 is as good as it gets in opera.

Jon Vickers has not recorded that many roles, but he is all the famous for them. His Tristan and Peter Grimes are among the greatest, and his Radamès is as good. I love Domingo's voice, but again, Vickers has all the traits of the Egyptian warrior.

Thanks to Solti and his cast, I am completely gripped by what would be a simple story in other hands.
A treasure!

Nico
The first half of life is spent in longing for the second, the second half in regretting the first.

knight66

The Solti is my favourite recording. I keep going back to it. There are some here who find Solti rather toxic. I agree re Vickers; though I think that almost all of his most famous roles have surfaced now. Some live recordings have supplemented the short change he received in the recording studios. I would not go quite all the way with you re Price, though I enjoy her a great deal. I do know just what you mean about Gorr. She does rather pull the temple down in that last act scene.

Mike
DavidW: Yeah Mike doesn't get angry, he gets even.
I wasted time: and time wasted me.

nico1616

Quote from: knight66 on March 24, 2012, 11:06:36 AM
I do know just what you mean about Gorr. She does rather pull the temple down in that last act scene.

Mike

It was meant as a figure of speech  :) The way she sings it is so overwhelming, it is as if the sky falls down on my head. To me, it is one of the greatest of all climaxes in opera.

Nico
The first half of life is spent in longing for the second, the second half in regretting the first.

knight66

Yea, I am agreeing with you.

Mike
DavidW: Yeah Mike doesn't get angry, he gets even.
I wasted time: and time wasted me.

Tsaraslondon

I guess I need to re-assess the Solti recording. As Mike well knows, though I enjoy the performances of Price and Vickers, I abhor Solti's over loud, emphatic and vulgar conducting of the score. I much prefer the lyricism of a Muti, or Serafin's central conducting on the Callas version, which always seems so unobtrusively right. I listen in vain on other recordings for the way Serafin makes the violins weep in the Nile Scene when Aida finally gives in to her father.

As for Amneris, I remember Gorr as being thrilling and barnstorming, but a little matronly. It is all too easy to forget that Amneris is a young, spoiled princess, driven wild with jealousy. Baltsa gets it just right on the second Karajan recording. Unfortunately the balance in this recording is so wrong. Quiet passages played so quietly that you can hardly hear them and loud sections so loud you can't hear the singers. The orcehstral playing is undeniably beautiful, but I do wish it wasn't brought so insistently into the foreground.


\"A beautiful voice is not enough.\" Maria Callas

zamyrabyrd

Quote from: Tsaraslondon on March 23, 2012, 10:49:44 AM

Not normally being a fan of Jessye Norman, particularly when she is singing in the soprano register, I must say I found this very impressive indeed. No, nore than impressive, absolutely thrilling. Not only is her singing admirably secure, but response to the text and the dramatic situation is wonderfully vivid and immediate. Fantastic!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wdG_lTz7zCY

Jessye becomes the ancient seer, the Sibyl of the text, as in the frescoes of Michelangelo prophesying the turmoil of the endtime.  I'll dispense with the superlatives and copy part of the Requiem instead:

Dies irae, dies illa
Solvet saeclum in favilla,
Teste David cum Sibylla.


Day of wrath, that day
Will dissolve the earth in ashes
As testified by David and the Sibyl.


I want to get the recording, seems to be conducted by Abbado, 1982, with the London Symphony.

ZB
"Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, one by one."

― Charles MacKay, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds

knight66

#375
Here is more from that recording: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KsEJOPjUYHs

The sound on the transfer onto Youtube is very poor, I suggest it is taken from a VHS live recording of the broadcast. It is fine on the DVD



This is a TV recording. I was in the choir for the concert, at the Edinburgh Festival. We performed it twice. In rehearsal Carerras complained that a couple of bum notes were down to orchestral players dropping pencils. Abbado then had to put up with the pitter pat of dropped pencils whenever the tenor looked like he might open his mouth.

Margaret Price is especially good. I think it is a very fine performance, but then I am biased.

So, instead of me burbling on: here is a possibly unbiased review from Amazon:

The live recording when this was broadcast from the Usher Hall at the Edinburgh Festival in 1982 was marred by terrible sound problems. I'm glad to be able to hear it without those glitches. This DVD has good sound for the 1980s. It is preferable to have the sound linked through to a decent hi-fi and speakers for a fuller appreciation. OK it may not match the sound recording qualities of modern performances but I'd rather see an exceptional concert like this one with decent sound than a run of the mill perormance in high quality sound.

The 4 soloists are excellent, the LSO under Abbado were a magnificent orchestra for live performances - their frequent live broadcasts on radio 3 were a highlight of my classical music listening in the 80s. The choral work is intense and raised the hairs on the back of my neck on several occasions.

I believe that "less is more" in all forms of music. I feel privileged to have heard music conducted by Claudio Abbado. He is one of classical musics best ever conductors for letting the music speak for itself and it certainly does that on this performance. If you prefer the conductors signature stamped all over the work and to see the unrestrained ego that some conductors have colouring the composers work you'll maybe be less impressed. But for me, the whole performance is electrifying.

Cannot recommend this enough. Five stars is not enough.

Mike
DavidW: Yeah Mike doesn't get angry, he gets even.
I wasted time: and time wasted me.

Tsaraslondon

#376
But this is not the performance I highlighted and to which ZB was responding. In the one I posted, Jessye Norman is the soprano soloist and Baltsa the mezzo. It appears to have been in Munich in 1981, with Muti conducting. Norman is magnificent in the Libera Me, and I would dearly love to hear the rest of this performance.

The 1982 Edinburgh performance with Abbado conducting has Norman as the mezzo soloist.
\"A beautiful voice is not enough.\" Maria Callas

knight66

There are two recordings being confused. The latest one that ZB mentioned was 1982 Abbado....so I have highlighted it.

Mike
DavidW: Yeah Mike doesn't get angry, he gets even.
I wasted time: and time wasted me.

Tsaraslondon

#378
Quote from: knight66 on March 25, 2012, 01:48:37 PM
There are two recordings being confused. The latest one that ZB mentioned was 1982 Abbado....so I have highlighted it.

Mike

But she was refering to Norman's singing of the Libera me and was mistakenly attributing it to the 1982 Abbado performance, where Norman is the mezzo. Just to be clear, in the 1982 Abbado, Norman takes the mezzo role, and Margaret Price the soprano. The excerpt I highlighted is from a different performance, apparently from 1981 and conducted by Muti, and she is singing the soprano role Baltsa is the mezzo here.



\"A beautiful voice is not enough.\" Maria Callas

zamyrabyrd

Thanks for clearing up that the Libera Me sung by Jessye Norman was from 1981. I couldn't find it anywhere yesterday but when searching up on Amazon, Norman and Price were both listed as sopranos on the 1982 recording. So I thought, did they give her the last part? But that didn't seem to be logical either.
It must have been such a thrill to sing in the chorus in such a work with great singers and conductor, Mike.

ZB
"Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, one by one."

― Charles MacKay, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds