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Vocal recitals.

78K views 390 replies 27 participants last post by  Tsaraslondon 
#1 · (Edited)
We don't seem to have anywhere on the site to discuss vocal recitals, so I thought I'd start one.

I'm returning to this box set at the moment.



This 5 disc set brings together most, though not all, of the recordings Dame Janet Baker made for Decca, Argo and Philips during the 1960s and 1970s. Though contracted to EMI (and Warner have a pretty exhaustive ten disc box set of her work for that label, called The Great Recordings), she made a few recordings for Decca/Argo (including her famous recording of Dido and Aeneas) in the early 60s, and then a tranche of recitals for Philips in the 1970s. The range of material here is not quite as wide as that on the aforementioned Warner, but takes us from 17th century arie through to Britten.

Disc 1 is a selection of what most vocal students would know as Arie Antiche (called here Arie Amorose), (in somewhat souped- up arrangements) by the Academy of St Martin in the Fields under Sir Neville Marriner. Whilst the arrangements can sound somewhat anachronistic today, Baker's wonderfully varied singing is not and each little song emerges as a little gem. The disc is rounded off with a couple of arias from La Calisto recorded shortly after her great success in the role of Diana/Jove at Glyndebourne.

Some of Baker's greatest early successes were in Handel and Disc 2 is mostly taken up by a superb 1972 Handel recital she made with the English Chamber Orchestra under Raymond Leppard. How brilliantly she charts the changing emotions in the cantata Lucrezia and also in the arioso-like Where shall I fly from Hercules,but each track displays the specificity of her art, the way she can express the despair in an aria like Scherza infida and the joy in Dopo notte. The disc is rounded off by a 1966 recording of Bach's Vergnügte Ruh and her incomparable When I am laid in earth from her 1961 recording of Dido and Aeneas.

Disc 3 has excerpts from a 1973 Mozart/Haydn recital and a 1976 Beethoven/Schubert disc, both made with Raymond Leppard, with the addition of arias from her complete recordings of la Clemenza di Tito and Cosí fan tutte under Sir Colin Davis. The two Haydn cantatas (one with piano and one with orchestra) are very welcome, but we do miss her stunning performance of Sesto's two big arias from La Clemenza di Tito, and her gently intimate performance of Mozart's Abendempfindung. Fortunately these have been included in a superb selection taken from the same two recitals on the Pentatone label, which includes all the missing Mozart and Schubert items. This disc also includes her recording of Beethoven's Ah perfido!, a little smaller in scale than some, but beautifully judged none the less. It doesn't have Callas's ferocity, it is true, but it is much more comfortably vocalised.

Disc 4 is of music by Rameau (excerpts from her 1965 recording of Hippolyte et Aricie, which well display her impassioned Phèdre), Gluck (arias for Orfeo and Alceste taken from her 1975 Gluck recital) and Berlioz (1979 performances of Cléopâtre and Herminie and Béatrice's big scene from Davis's complete 1977 recording of Béatrice et Bénédict). The biggest loss here is of the majority of the Gluck recital, which included many rare items, though the complete reictal was at one time available on one of Philips's budget labels. Baker is without doubt one of the greatest Berlioz exponents of all time, and the two scènes lyriques are especially welcome, the range of expression in both fully exploited.

Disc 5 is of late nineteenth and twentieth century French song and Benjamin Britten; the whole of a disc of French song made with the Melos Ensmble in 1966, excerpts from the composers own recordings of The Rape of Lucretia and Owen Wingraveand Phaedra, which was composed specifically for her. The Melos disc includes Ravel's Chansons Madécasses and Trois poèmes de Stéphane Mallarmé, Chausson's Chanson perpétuelle and Delage's Quatre poèmes hindous and is a fine example of Baker's felicity in French chanson. The Britten excerpts remind us of her sympathetic portrayal of Lucretia and her unpleasant Kate in Owen Wingrave. The Britten cantata is a great example of her controlled intensity.

Remarkable throughout is the care and concentration of her interpretations. Nothing is glossed over, nothing taken for granted, and she was one of those artists who could bring the frisson of live performance into the studio. Nor do I think she ever made a bad record. One of my all time favourite singers.
 
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#206 ·


It's as well to remember that Callas only approved about half of the items on this disc for release, and then only after she had been inactive for some years. The voice, particularly in the first aria, O madre dal cielo from I Lombardi is often uningratiating and there are some audible tape joins before high notes. Most of the items were recorded in 1964 and 1965, around the same time as her return to the stage, though the two later items, the arias from Il Corsaro, were recorded in 1969 and are, surprisingly, more comfortable to listen to.

That said, the artistry and immagination remain as does her command of fioriture, as well as Verdian style. Students could learn a lot about how to shape and measure the weight of a phrase.

I have reviewed this more extensively on my blog, if anyone is interested https://tsaraslondon.wordpress.com/2017/01/05/verdi-arias-iii/
 
#207 ·
A couple of vocal recitals.



Dame Maggie Teyte in concert, at the age of sixty no less! Teyte, a famous Mélisande who studied the role with Debussy himself, sings extended excerpts from the opera with piano accompaniment, singing all the roles. It shouldn't work, but somehow it does. It takes her the first song in the recital (Grétry's Rose chérie) to warm up, but thereafter you would never believe this was the voice of a sixty year old woman. The disc also includes privately recorded excerpts from Strauss's Salome also with piano, from when Teyte was preparing the role for Covent Garden about fifteen years earlier, a project that unofrtunately never came to fruition. Her bright, slivery soprano might just have been the voice Strauss imagined.

She also sings Britten's Les Illuminations in a version for piano, making me wish she had recorded the orchestral version, although preferably a few years earlier. Just occasionally there is a flicker of frailty in the middle voice, although the top register remains firm and clear as a bell. The encores include a lovely performance of Hahn's popular Si mes vers avaient des ailes.



Another enterprising disc from Dawn Upshaw, who seems to have disappeared from the scene now. The centrepiece is Earl Kim's Where grief slumbers written in 1982 for voice, harp and string orchestra, but here presented in a 1990 arrangement for voice, double string quartet and harp, and Upshaw is an ideal interpreter. She is equally at home in the rest of the programme; Falla's Psyché, Ravel's Trois poèmes de Stéphane Mallarmé, Stravinsky's Two poems of Konstantin Bel'mont and Three Japanese Lyrics and Delage's Quatre poèmes hindous, though here I slightly prefer the warmer tones of Dame Janet Baker. Nevertheless a thoroughly absorbing disc.

As with so many of these Nonsuch discs, documentation is slight, and, though we are vouchsafed lyrics and translations, a little more information about the provenance of these songs, especially the less famous Kim cycle, would have been much appreciated.
 
#208 ·


Renée Fleming was at her peak when this recital was recorded and this is, without doubt, one of her most successful records. The programme is a varied one too, with familiar items like Gershwin's Summertime and Bernstein's Glitter and be gay rubbing shoulders with items from more rarely performed works like Hermann's Wuthering Heights and Floyd's Susannah. The inclusion of Anne's No word from Tom from Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress rather stretches the subtitle American Opera Arias a bit, but is possibly justified as Auden, Kallman and Stravinsky were all resident in the US at the time of its composition.

The disc opens with a short extract from Bernard Herrmann's Wuthering Heights, which was written in 1943 but never staged in Herrmann's lifetime. In fact it was only premiered in 1982 by Portland Opera, but with the ending changed to one Julius Rudel had proposed several years earlier. It wasn't performed in full until 2011, by Minnesota Opera. I have dreamt, lusciously sung here by Fleming, woud suggest the opera might be worth further investigation.

The excerpts from Douglas Moore's The Ballad of Baby Doe and Menotti's The Medium are both lovely in every way, but the Gershwin items from Porgy and Bess suffer from a lack of spontaneity. Fleming introduces all sorts of jazzy slides and glottal attacks which simply sound affected. Leontyne Price sings this music much more simply and allows the music to blossom on its own.

The considerable difficulties of Bernstein's Glitter and be gay are tossed off with ease and here she captures the irony in the piece marvellously. It's a piece that, unsurprisingly, many opera singers have added to their repertoire but few of them challenge the original interpreter, Broadway star Barbara Cook, who created the role and whose diction is a good deal more clear. To be honest, the only "operatic" version I've heard that does is Dawn Upshaw's, but Fleming's is certainly amongst the best.

Next we have two pieces from Carlisle Floyd's Susannah, which brought back happy memories of seeing Fleming in the role at the Met shortly after she recorded these exceprts. She is at her considerable best here, flooding the gratefully lyrical lines with gorgeous tone, but also capturing the character's longing for adventure in the first, her loneliness in the second.

Finally we have a reminiscence of her Anne Trulove, which she sang at the Aspen Music Festival in 1987 and a taster of her Blanche Dubois in Previn's A Streetcar Named Desire, which she premiered soon after making this recording. She has a richer voice than most Annes, but negotiates its complexities with ease and her Blanche is simply hors concours. The aria I want magic was an obvious high spot when she sang the role in London with the LSO, but I rather wish they had also included the final aria, I can smell the sea air, which had a huge effect on me each time I heard it whilst waiting in the wings to make my entrance as the doctor. It was one of the most beautiful things I've ever heard.

Sandwiched between the Stravinsky and the Previnwe have Vanessa's passionate Act I aria from Barber's opera, which left me wondering why nobody had thought to revive the opera with Fleming in the title role. It would have suited her perfectly.
 
#209 · (Edited)


A few weeks ago I reviewed Renée Fleming's excellent disc of American opera arias and today I turn to Dawn Upshaw's disc, which takes its title, The World So Wide, from the first item in the recital, Laurie's Song from Aaron Copland's The Tender Land. It makes a lovely opener and Upshaw is perfectly cast as the young girl who yearns to escape and see the world.

At about 45 minutes, the disc is quite short measure, however, and not everything is as good as the first track. The piece from Tanía León's Scourge of Hyacinths is tediously declamatory and afforded me the least enjoyment on the disc. I'd also suggest that Upshaw's is not the right voice for Barber's Cleopatra, a role that was written for the much more opulent voice of Leontyne Price. Upshaw's lighter, brighter sounds do not conjure up the woman of whom Enobarbus says,

Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale
Her infinite variety. Other women cloy
The appetites they feed, but she makes hungry
Where most she satisfies, for vilest things
Become themselves in her, that the holy priests
Bless her when she is riggish.
I enjoyed the excerpt from John Adams Nixon in China rather more than the Gramophone reviewer, who fund it "tediously protracted", and I suppose you either like Adams's style or you don't. Whatever your feelings, Upshaw delivers Pat Nixon's This is prophetic brilliantly. She is also superb in the more Broadway influenced What a movie from Bernstein's Trouble in Tahiti, but I thought her singing of Lonely house (an aria sung by the male character of Sam Kaplan in Street Scene) just a little too overtly operatic. Teresa Stratas manages it better on her second disc of Weill songs and arias.

After the Copland and Benstein, the most successful item on the disc is Willow Song from Douglas Moore's The Ballad of Baby Doe, which responds well to her charming, uncomplicated manner. So too, one would think, does the final item (and the only item she shares with Fleming on her disc), Ain't it a pretty night from Carlisle Floyd's Susannah, but here I have to admit I prefer the rather more sensuos tones of Fleming, who suggests a far more highly charged eroticism behind the apparent simplicity of the music.

A mixed bag, then, and not so successful as her disc of Broadway songs entitled I Wish It So, but worth a listen for the unusual repertoire and for some excellent performances.
 
#210 · (Edited)
Skin Lip Chin Hand Plant


One of my latest purchases was this album by Albanian soprano Ermonela Jaho. I find most recent recital albums have been disappointing for one reason or another and both the classical music recording industry and CD market are in decline.

Despite Jaho being one of my two favourite sopranos singing today, most of the items on this disc have been sung better by others (although there are enough rarities for their to be something new for most opera fans as well), the other initial drawback is that it is a homage album to the singer Rosina Storchio. Homage albums tend to be good ideas that end badly (the worst being Gheorgiu's one to Callas which succeeded merely in proving that, despite her dreams to the contrary, Gheorgiu is NOT Callas!) Bartoli fared better, but then she intelligently compared herself with Malibran, who died well before recording technology was invented. Her disc 'Maria' was interesting from an academic point of view, presenting some interesting rarities, but the inevitable inclusion of well known works left me wanting when we have such wonderful examples from Callas, Caballe and Sutherland to compare with.

When it comes to this disc, however, the Storchio connection isn't that much a defining feature of the recital as it is just the sort of rep that Jaho has been singing and mostly praised in. (It starts and ends with the two Butterfly arias, a role that is practically a calling card of hers and in which I haven't heard an equal in the last twenty years.) She also sings the act three Traviata aria and then we get a succession of rarities with the odd better known piece thrown in. All is wonderfully done, although she tends to be more passionate in live performance. I have only given it one listen so far and would have to go back and try it again, but it's all done with great sensitivity to both music and text. She doesn't erase memories of some of the great interpretations of the past where she sings rep that was recorded by Callas, De los Angeles, Freni or even Gheorgiu, but there is enough here and of a good enough quality to make this well worth the purchase price.

N.
 
#211 ·
View attachment 145151

One of my latest purchases was this album by Albanian soprano Ermonela Jaho. I find most recent recital albums have been disappointing for one reason or another and both the classical music recording industry and CD market are in decline.

Despite Jaho being one of my two favourite sopranos singing today, most of the items on this disc have been sung better by others (although there are enough rarities for their to be something new for most opera fans as well), the other initial drawback is that it is a homage album to the singer Rosina Storchio. Homage albums tend to be good ideas that end badly (the worst being Gheorgiu's one to Callas which succeeded merely in proving that, despite her dreams to the contrary, Gheorgiu is NOT Callas!) Bartoli fared better, but then she intelligently compared herself with Malibran, who died well before recording technology was invented. Her disc 'Maria' was interesting from an academic point of view, presenting some interesting rarities, but the inevitable inclusion of well known works left me wanting when we have such wonderful examples from Callas, Caballe and Sutherland to compare with.

When it comes to this disc, however, the Storchio connection isn't that much a defining feature of the recital as it is just the sort of rep that Jaho has been singing and mostly praised in. (It starts and ends with the two Butterfly arias, a role that is practically a calling card of hers and in which I haven't heard an equal in the last twenty years.) She also sings the act three Traviata aria and then we get a succession of rarities with the odd better known piece thrown in. All is wonderfully done, although she tends to be more passionate in live performance. I have only given it one listen so far and would have to go back and try it again, but it's all done with great sensitivity to both music and text. She doesn't erase memories of some of the great interpretations of the past where she sings rep that was recorded by Callas, De los Angeles, Freni or even Gheorgiu, but there is enough here and of a good enough quality to make this well worth the purchase price.

N.
I haven't heard the whole recital, but I did do a recent comparison of different singers in Boito's L'altra notte.

The singers were Tebald, Callas, Kyra Vane, Caballé, De Los Angele and Michelle Crieder. Leaving interpretation aside for the moment, the first thing that struck me was Jaho's heavy vibrato, which seems to be part of the voice itself, not something added for expression. All of the others apart from Crieder, were much cleaner with a firmer core to their voices. The only one with a vibrato approaching that of Jaho's was the much more recently recorded Crieder. I found Jaho's vibrato intrusive and the aria didn't invite me to listen to any more.
 
#213 ·
That's interesting. She certainly isn't up to the standard of past divas either vocally or interpretatively, however I find her warm vibrato pleasant enough and whilst she suffers from a certain amount of potato in the mouth, she is one of the better singers performing today.

N.
I have seen her on stage just the once - as Desdemona in Covent Garden's recent Otello - and I really liked her, nor did I notice any excessive vibrato. Of course it's quite possible that it is accentuated on records.
 
#215 ·


Now here is an interesting and enterprising collection of music centred around Richard Dehmel's poem Verklärte Nacht, which most famously inspired Schoenberg's great work, which is included in its orchestral incarnation here.

I'm guessing not many would be able to identify the composer of the first work here, a powerful tone poem for tenor and orchestra depicting the hallucinations of a young soldier in a field hospital during World War I. The Mahlerian influences are obvious but I doubt many would hazard the name of Franz Lehár. This is a piece I am very much going to enjoy getting to know.

It is followed by a setting of Verklärte Nacht for tenor, mezzo-soprano and orchestra by Oskar Fried, a Mahler champion, and written at about the same time as Schoenberg's more well known work. It makes an interesting and apposite opening to the Schoenberg, which follows. An excellent performance here from the BBC SO under Edward Gardiner.

The disc closes with another rarity, Korngold's Songs of Farewell, composed not long after his opera, Die tote Stadt and in a similar lush and lyrical vein. Highly recommended.
 
#216 ·


Now this is rather special. The young French/Danish soprano Elsa Dreisig follows up her excellent debut album of operatic excerpts with this beautifully compiled recital of songs for voice and piano, showing that she is equally at home in the more intimate surroundings of the recital room. The programme is an interesting one with the piano accompanied versions of Strauss's Vier letzte Lieder (plus his final ever song Malven) split up and inserted into different points of the recital. The songs weren't orginally planned as a cycle in any case, and this makes for some fascinating juxtapositions. The rest of the programme is made up of songs by Rachmaninov and Duparc and leads us on a most satisfying journey, "an inner journey across the seasons of the soul," as Dreisig writes in the accompanying notes.

The North Star, our guide, is Strauss with thes Four Last Songs (or five if we count Malven, his final song), in conversation with Duparc and Rachmaninov. Starting at the dawn of Spring and of youth, we visit Summer and its passions then, by way of Autumn nights and the dreamlike world of spleep, we come to face to face with the unknown and with passing time. A journey of initiation, one that allows us to contemplate loss and death, thinking all the while of tomorrow: morgen.
Save for Rachmaninov's The Pied Piper the mood is generally dreamy and Dreisig and her accompanist, the superb Jonathan Ware, create spell bindng magic, drawing us in to their carefully crafted programme. Dreisig's voice is a lovely, lyric soprano with a pearly, opalescent radiance that suits all these songs perfectly, but she is much more than a lovely voice. What is unusual is her rare gift for communication, her innate musicality and the specificity of her response to all these songs.

The highlights for me are her languidly dreamy and erotic rendition of Duparc's Phidylé and Extase, Rachmaninov's At Night In My Garden, and all the Strauss items gorgeously sung, yet with due attention to the text. I do hope Dresig will soon get to record the orchestral version of his Vier letzte Lieder. Ware plays magnificently, probably the best version of the piano accompaniment I have ever heard, but I do miss Strauss's glorious orchestration. A total contrast is afforded when she follows it with her superbly suggestive singing of Rachmaninov's The Pied Piper, which shows off admirably her brilliant gift for characterisation, but really there isn't a dud in the whole recitial

This is a wonderful disc and one of the best soprano song recitals I have heard in a very long time. Start the disc from the beginning and allow these artists to take you along on their journey. One listen quickly became two. Dreisig turns thirty this year. Let us hope that the pandemic has not stimmied a career that was just starting to get going. Warmly recommended.
 
#217 ·


This disc is mostly taken from a recital given by Ricciarelli in Switzerland in 1979, with the final two items from a concert given the following year. The programme is a good one, starting with bel canto items and finishing with verismo, with early and middle period Verdi bridging the gap.

The voice is mostly in good shape, though it develops a slight beat on high when under pressure, more noticeable in the verismo items than it is in the gentler bel canto she chooses, and it is the items by Bellini, Donizetti and Verdi that make the greatest impression.

We start with Giulietta's Oh quante volte from I Capuleti e i Montecchi, a role that suited her like a glove and for which she receieved rave reviews when she sang it at Covent Garden in a revival of the production first mounted for Gruberova and Baltsa. I also heard her sing the aria at a recital at the Barbican Hall in 1987 in a programme very similar to the one we have here. This aria was undoubtedly the highlight of the night and she was forced to encore it at the end of the evening. She spins out the phrases quite deiciously and with superb musicality and, as she never has to force her voice, the result is mesmerisingly beautiful.

The Donizetti items are also beautifully moulded, the lines caressed, though one notes that she does not sing the more forceful cabaletta to the Anna Bolena aria, and I imagine it would have taxed her limits, though she did sing the role quite a lot, apparently with much success. The Lucrezia Borgia is also an elegiac piece and again she fills its phrases with signifcance, her phrasing unfailingly musical.

Of the two Verdi items the first from Il Corsaro suits her better and I rather wish that she had been cast in Gardelli's Philps recording of 1976. Norman, who sings Medora, isn't bad by any means, but Ricciarelli is more inside the music, more stylish. The following year she joined the Philips early Verdi stable, singing Lucrezia in I Due Foscari and Lida in La Battaglia de Legnano and she is superb in both.

The Forza aria suggests that the role may have been a bit too big for her and the voice does rather glare on the climactic Bb on Maledizion. The floated one on Invan la pace is better, but still sounds a mite insecure.

The verismo arias also have their attractions and are very well received by the audiences, possibly because they were better known, but again climactic high notes are apt to glare uncomfortably, particularly in the exposed climax to Wally's lovely Ebben. Ne andro lontana. None the less the aria is beautifully felt and delivered with a sighing loneliness that is most effective. She also differentiates nicely between Tosca's utter desperation and Butterfly's single minded conviction that Pinkerton will return.

All in all, then a rewarding programme. Ricciarelli is a singer I have come to admire more with the passing years. More vocally fallible than such contemporaries as Freni or Caballé, less individual in her response to the text than Scotto, her singing is unfailingly musical and I derived a lot of pleasure from this recital.
 
#218 · (Edited)
I recently treated myself to a nice box - Les Introuvables du Chant Verdien. I’ve listened to CD 1, Ernani and Trovatore. Some great singing but the standout track for all sorts of reasons, some of them very wrong!, is Timor Di Me sung by Emmy Destinn. I urge those of you who are interested to try and hear this. Absolutely mental for the last couple of minutes. A masterclass in throwing the kitchen sink at an aria and then following it up with the rest of the kitchen!

It cheered me up no end. I see that it is on YouTube. Enjoy. :lol:
 
#219 · (Edited)
I recently treated myself to a nice box - Les Introuvables du Chant Verdien. I've listened to CD 1, Ernani and Trovatore. Some great singing but the standout track for all sorts of reasons, some of them very wrong!, is Timor Di Me sung by Emmy Destinn. I urge those of you who are interested to try and hear this. Absolutely mental for the last couple of minutes. A masterclass in throwing the kitchen sink at an aria and then following it up with the rest of the kitchen!

It cheered me up no end. I see that it is on YouTube. Enjoy. :lol:
It's hardly subtle, is it? This is what John Steane says sbout the recording in The Grand Tradition

The 'D'amor sull'ali rosee' from Il Trovatore has the distinction of excellent trills, a fine cadenza, some high notes taken with marvellous softness and accuracy, a stunning high D flat, and some interesting phrasing. Even so, it remains a very extravert performance, rarely relaxing, rarely attempting or achieving subtety. Modern singers could learn much from it in matters of tone and technique, but no doubt Destinn might have learnt from them in the matter of interpretation.
I can but agree and note that she hardly begins to weave into the piece the atmosphere of night and mystery I require. My yardstick is, predictably, Callas ("That woman is a miracle," according to Schwarzkopf when she heard her sing it at La Scala in 1953), but I also enjoy versions from Ponselle, Leontyne Price, Rosalind Plowright (in the Giulini recording) and, surprsingly perhaps, Frida Leider, who sings in German, but with a fine sense of style and superb trills.

The Introuvables series are all very collectible and I've been looking for a reasonably priced Verdi one for some time.
 
#223 · (Edited)


Well I took the plunge and got this eight disc set. There's a lot to get through, but so far I've listened to the first four discs and I have discovered some new names.

The greats, like Ponselle, Caruso and Pinza still shine through, but almost every one of these singers has something to offer, not least the clean focus of their voices as compared to many of today's singers.

A big surprise for me was hearing Schwarzkopf and Panerai sing the Act II duet for Violetta and Germont from La Traviata. Famously Schwarzkopf dropped the role of Violetta after seeing Callas, saying she saw no point in continuing to sing a role another contemporary artist performed to perfection. However this duet suggests that Schwarzkopf was an appreciable Violetta, urgently dramatic and emotionally engaged, with no trace of artifice or mannerism. Definitely worth hearing.
 
#224 ·


Well I took the plunge and got this eight disc set. There's a lot to get through, but so far I've listened to the first four discs and I have discovered some new names.

The greats, like Ponselle, Caruso and Pinza still shine through, but almost every one of these singers has something to offer, not least the clean focus of their voices as compared to many of today's singers.

A big surprise for me was hearing Schwarzkopf and Panerai sing the Act II duet for Violetta and Germont from La Traviata. Famously Schwarzkopf dropped the role of Violetta after seeing Callas, saying she saw no point in continuing to sing a role another contemporary artist performed to perfection. However this duet suggests that Schwarzkopf was an appreciable Violetta, urgently dramatic and emotionally engaged, with no trace of artifice or mannerism. Definitely worth hearig.
Thanks for the tip regarding Schwarzkopf. Had she been available, I'd perhaps prefer her to Stella as substitute for Callas in the 1955 set: Schwarzkopf, di Stefano, Gobbi and Serafin...

Come to think of it, Schwarzkopf worked with all three separately: di Stefano on the Verdi Requiem and would go on to work with Gobbi in Falstaff and Serafin on the Turandot recording.
 
#228 ·
View attachment 158351

I cannot count how many times I've listened to this recital. One of Leontyne's first albums and one of my favorite recital discs ever!
This was when she was a lyric soprano, before she got into the heavy Verdi roles and the bad habits. It sure was a gorgeous voice and in this recital, very well used. Love this record.
 
#230 · (Edited)


Returning to this fascinating set with Disc 4, which is made up of excerpts from Nabucco (Nazzareno de Angelis, Ines de Frate and Carlo Galeffi) and La Fora del Destino (Gina Cigna, Celestina Bonisegna, Dusolina Giannini, Ivar Andresen and Meta Seinemeyer, Pinza and Ponselle, Francesco Merli, Caruso and Antonio Scotti, Heinrich Schlusnus, Gino Bechi and Lauri-Volpi, Salomea Kruszelnicka, Milanov and finishing up with the final trio featuring Pinza, Ponselle and Martinelli).

Not all are faultless (De Angelis and Cigna both display a tendency to aspirate) and not all are equally imaginative, but what magnificent voices. You really don't hear Verdi sung like this anymore.
 
#231 ·


Otherwise known as The Elisabeth Schwarzkopf Christmas Album and if you're going to do a Christmas Album, then this is certainly a classy affair, with the Philharmonia Orchestra and Ambrosian Singers conducted by Sir Charles Mackerras. The arrangements are by Sir Charles too, all except Stille Nacht, which uses the arrangement from the first ever performance, with Schwarzkopf duetting with herself to an accompaniment of guitar and French horn.

Pure delight.
 
#233 ·


TRACKLIST - EDEN

Charles Ives 1874-1954
The Unanswered Question

Rachel Portman b.1960
The First Morning of the World*

Gustav Mahler 1860-1911
Rückert-Lieder
"Ich atmet' einen linden Duft!"

Biagio Marini 1594-1663
Scherzi e canzone Op.5
"Con le stelle in ciel che mai"

Josef Mysliveček 1737-1781
Oratorio Adamo ed Eva (Part II)
Aria: "Toglierò le sponde al mare" (Angelo di giustizia)

Aaron Copland 1900-1990
8 Poems of Emily Dickinson for voice and chamber orchestra
Nature, the gentlest mother

Giovanni Valentini c.1582-1649
Sonata enharmonica

Francesco Cavalli 1602-1676
Opera La Calisto (Act I, Scene 14)
Aria: "Piante ombrose" (Calisto)

Christoph Willibald Gluck 1714-1787
Opera Orfeo ed Euridice Wq. 30
Danza degli spettri e delle furie. Allegro non troppo

Christoph Willibald Gluck 1714-1787
Scena ed aria Misera, dove son! From Ezio Wq. 15 (Fulvia)
Scena: "Misera, dove son!… "
Aria: "Ah! non son io che parlo…"

George Frideric Handel 1685-1759
Dramatic oratorio Theodora HWV 68 (Part I)
Aria: "As with Rosy steps the morn" (Irene)

Gustav Mahler
Rückert-Lieder
"Ich bin der Welt abhanden gekommen"

Richard Wagner 1813-1883
5 Gedichte für eine Frauenstimme WWV 91 (Wesendonck Lieder)
"Schmerzen"

George Frideric Handel
Opera Serse HWV 40 (Act I, Scene 1)
Recitativo: "Frondi tenere e belle"
Aria: "Ombra mai fù" (Serse)

*World-premiere recording

Joyce DiDonato's new album could probably best be described as a concept album and, despite one or two less than smooth transitions, is best listened to in one sitting and in the order she has set out.

At present DiDonato is in the middle of a twelve city tour, taking in both Europe and the USA and I am very much looking forward to seeing her perform at the Barbican in April. Looking at the photographs from some of the concerts she has already done, DiDonato is using to redefine the the recital format. Apparently every audience member is to receive a seed to plant as they're asked: 'In this time of upheaval, which seed will you plant today?'

"With each passing day," writes DiDonato, "I trust more and more in the perfect balance, astonishing mystery and guiding force of the natural world around us, how much Mother Nature has to teach us. EDEN is an invitation to return to our roots and to explore whether or not we are connecting as profoundly as we can to the pure essence of our being, to create a new EDEN from within and plant seeds of hope for the future."

As on the album, she is accompanied by her regular collaborators Il Pomo d'Oro under Maxim Emelyanchev.

The programme ranges wide, from the 17th to the 21st century and at least one change, when we go from the 21st century to the 17th strikes me as a little jarring, but for the most part the choices are sensible and the journey well thought out.

The album starts with an absolutely haunting performance of Ives' The Unanswered Question, in which DiDonato wordlessly sings the trumpet part. This segues into a commission from the Academy Award winning composer Rachel Portman, entitled The First Morning of the World, to a text by American writer Gene Scheer. This is a wonderfully evocative piece, full of sweeping lyricsm and gorgeous harmonies. Portman surely could not have hoped for a more beautiful performance. This is followed by a lovely performance of Mahler's Ich atmet einen Linden Duft, though we miss the richness of Mahler's original orchestra in this chamber re-orchestration.

The first slightly incongruous transition happens here with Biagio Marini's Con le stelle in ciel che mai, though there is nothing wrong with its execution and, once I'd got used to being plunged into an entirely different sound world I enjoyed it and the Mysliveček aria from his orotorio, Adamo ed Eva, which follows.

This first part of the recital finishes with a masterful performance of Nature, the Gentlest Mother from Aaron Copland's 8 Poems of Emily Dickinson, beautifully played by Il Pomo d'Oro and in which DiDonato sings with excellent diction without compromising her legato line.

It is followed by one of two purely orchestral tracks, the Sonata enharmonica by Giuseppe Valentini. The other is Gluck's Dance of the Spirits and Furies from Orfeo ed Euridice.

DoDonato is known to us as a great Handel singer and one of the highlights of the album is Irene's As with rosy steps the morn from Theodora, which is deeply felt, even if ultimately for me it doesn't quite erase memories of Lorraine Hunt Lieberson in the same music. Handel is also reserved for the final piece, which comes after Mahler and Wagner, leaving us to bask in the peace and calm of his Ombra mai fu.

DiDonato is in fine voice throughout, her fast flicker vibrato, which can sometimes be intrusive, hardly in evidence at all. I must say that I rather like this "concept" and I have no hesitation recommending this album, and I would urge you to listen to it in one sitting. If I have sometimes had reservations about DiDonato's ability to convey personality and individuality in the studio, I have no such reservations here and would recommend this album unreservedly.
 
#234 · (Edited)


Disc 5 of this entralling set has excerpts from Don Carlo and I Vespri Siciliani.

One or two misses, amongst which I'd include Margarete Arndt-Ober's Veil Song (considering her lack of a tril and flexibility, you wonder why she recorded it) and Clara Butt's matronly O don fatale. Frida Leider also sings O don fatale and she is much more interesting, without really convincing me that she is an Eboli.

Rosa Raisa, the first Turandot, sings Elena's Merce, dliette amiche with wonderful lightness, an excellent trill and superb flexibility (though she alters the line when it dips down below the stave), which makes me wonder if the Nilsson-type voice is really what Puccini had in mind for Turandot. Ester Mazzoleni also alters the end of Arrigo, ah parli a un core to avoid the chromatic scale that takes her down to a low F#, but otherwise phrases beautifully. I rather liked her fast flicker vibrato.

There are some excellent performances from the men, including Plançon singing part of Philip's Act III scena in French, Riccardo Stracciarin in Montfort's In braccia alle dovizie, Christoff and Gobbi in the Act II duet from Don Carlo, Gobbi in 1942, reminding us that he could sing with great beauty of tone in Posa's Per me giunto and Io morro and , possibly most impressive of all, Christoff in a 1950 performance of the whole of Philip's Act III scena, immeasurably helped by Karajan and the Philharmonia. The mournful orchestral introduction superbly sets the scene for Christoff's heartbreaking rendition and Karajan supports him every step of the way.
 
#237 · (Edited)


This box set brings together the five LPs of Rachmaninov songs Söderström and Ashkenazy recorded between 1975 and 1980. Wonderful though it is to have them altogether, I do have one gripe. No doubt the programme for each individual LP was carefully thought out, though, as most of the well known songs appeared on the first one, I rather doubt a complete set was considered at that time. With the five LPs now spread over three CDs, it seems to me it would have made more sense to rearrange the songs into chronological order and into their various opus numbers. The booklet does in fact so this in a separate listing after the track listing and it also discusses the songs in that order too. At least this issue does give us all the texts and translations, which is something you can't take for granted anymore.

It seems unlikely anyway that anyone would listen to them in one sitting, but this is more or less what I did, taking in the first disc yesterday and the others today. Performances are uniformly excellent and Söderström is sensitive to every mood, though most of the songs are quite melancholy. Ashkenazy is a superb accompanist in the often virtuosic piano writing and one feels that the two artists are involved in a true collaboration. Perhaps because the first disc includes most of the plums, I found it the most enjoyable but there are treasures on the others as well. John Shirley-Quirk makes an appearance for the duet Two partings and Ashkenazy is given two solos in the piano only arrangements of Daisies and Lilacs.

Söderström is perhaps not so well remembered now as she should be. She had a lovely lyrical soprano, perhaps not so individual or recognisable as some, but an intelligent and musical singer who excels in these songs.
 
#238 ·


This set was originally issued on three LPs back in 1984, and later condensed into two very well filled CDs and is still available as a download. As such, it is an excellent way of collecting all Ravel’s song settings, the singers all being well chosen for the songs they are allocated. It also has Michel Plasson in charge of the orchestral and chamber accompanied songs and that master accompanist, Dalton Baldwin, at the piano.

We start with Teresa Berganza singing Shéhérazade, orchestrally fine and well sung, but Berganza is just a little anonymous and the performance doesn’t stay in the memory as do those by, say, Crespin, Hendricks or Baker, all of whom are more vivid storytellers. The orchestral contribution by Plasson and his Toulouse orchestra is splendid. This is followed by the Vocalise en forme de Habanera and Chanson espagnole, ideal performances in which Berganza finds the erotic sensuality that had eluded her in Shéhérazade.

Next up is Gabriel Bacquier, who is entrusted with Histoires naturelles, Sur l’herbe and Chanson française. These are superb performances, Bacquier finding just the right sense of ironic derachment for the Renard settings, his enunciation of the text so clear you can all but taste the words.

Mady Mesplé’s clear, bright, very French soprano with its characteristic flutter vibrato is not to everyone’s taste, but I like her, and she is absolutey charming in the Greek songs, including the less regularly performed Tripatos. She also gives us lovely performances of three rarities, Ballade de la reine morte d’aimer, Manteau de fleurs and Rêves. José Van Dam gets the Hebrew settings, Don Quichotte à Dulcinée and five more songs, of which Les grands vents venus d’outre-mer is especially notable. To all he contributes the sterling virtues of his beautiful, firm bass-baritone, coupled to sensitive treatment of the text.

Felicity Lott, charming in the Noël des jouets and Chanson écossaise, also has the Mallarmé poems, in which she is suitably languid, if a little diffident. She is also good in the two Clément Marot settings, but Maggie Teyte gets more out of the words on her recording. Jessye Norman brings the collection to a close with the Chansons madécasses, as well as Chanson du rouet and Si morne. As usual, Norman is never less than involved, but as so often I find she sings with an all-purpose generosity, and I’d have welcomed a little more of Janet Baker specificity. Still this is nitpicking, and hers are still among the best versions of these wonderful songs. Throughout the piano accompanied songs Dalton Baldwin provides superbly idiomatic playing, with the Ensemble de Chambre de l’orchestre de Paris providing the accompaniment for the Mallarmé settings and Michel Debost on flute and Renaud Fontanarosa on cello in the Madegascan songs.

Altogether, this is a wonderfully rewarding set and, if individual performances have been bettered elsewhere, all are more than adequate and many a great deal more than that, though, on this occasion, it is the gentlemen who take the palm. Warmly recommended.
 
#239 ·


This set was originally issued on three LPs back in 1984, and later condensed into two very well filled CDs and is still available as a download. As such, it is an excellent way of collecting all Ravel’s song settings, the singers all being well chosen for the songs they are allocated. It also has Michel Plasson in charge of the orchestral and chamber accompanied songs and that master accompanist, Dalton Baldwin, at the piano.

We start with Teresa Berganza singing Shéhérazade, orchestrally fine and well sung, but Berganza is just a little anonymous and the performance doesn’t stay in the memory as do those by, say, Crespin, Hendricks or Baker, all of whom are more vivid storytellers. The orchestral contribution by Plasson and his Toulouse orchestra is splendid. This is followed by the Vocalise en forme de Habanera and Chanson espagnole, ideal performances in which Berganza finds the erotic sensuality that had eluded her in Shéhérazade.

Next up is Gabriel Bacquier, who is entrusted with Histoires naturelles, Sur l’herbe and Chanson française. These are superb performances, Bacquier finding just the right sense of ironic derachment for the Renard settings, his enunciation of the text so clear you can all but taste the words.

Mady Mesplé’s clear, bright, very French soprano with its characteristic flutter vibrato is not to everyone’s taste, but I like her, and she is absolutey charming in the Greek songs, including the less regularly performed Tripatos. She also gives us lovely performances of three rarities, Ballade de la reine morte d’aimer, Manteau de fleurs and Rêves. José Van Dam gets the Hebrew settings, Don Quichotte à Dulcinée and five more songs, of which Les grands vents venus d’outre-mer is especially notable. To all he contributes the sterling virtues of his beautiful, firm bass-baritone, coupled to sensitive treatment of the text.

Felicity Lott, charming in the Noël des jouets and Chanson écossaise, also has the Mallarmé poems, in which she is suitably languid, if a little diffident. She is also good in the two Clément Marot settings, but Maggie Teyte gets more out of the words on her recording. Jessye Norman brings the collection to a close with the Chansons madécasses, as well as Chanson du rouet and Si morne. As usual, Norman is never less than involved, but as so often I find she sings with an all-purpose generosity, and I’d have welcomed a little more of Janet Baker specificity. Still this is nitpicking, and hers are still among the best versions of these wonderful songs. Throughout the piano accompanied songs Dalton Baldwin provides superbly idiomatic playing, with the Ensemble de Chambre de l’orchestre de Paris providing the accompaniment for the Mallarmé settings and Michel Debost on flute and Renaud Fontanarosa on cello in the Madegascan songs.

Altogether, this is a wonderfully rewarding set and, if individual performances have been bettered elsewhere, all are more than adequate and many a great deal more than that, though, on this occasion, it is the gentlemen who take the palm. Warmly recommended.
Can you point me to a link for the download please Tsaras?
 
#241 ·


This is a gorgeous recital, which I once had on LP. If I remember correctly, the French items were on side 1 and the Spanish on side 2.

The French items certainly have their atrractions, but Duparc's Chanson triste, one of his most beautiful songs, is just too slow and doesn't erase memories of Maggie Teyte, who adopts a much more flowing tempo in her version with Gerald Moore, and when it comes to the Cinq Mélodies populiares grecques, I prefer the simpler, clearer tones of Victoria De Los Angeles or Mady Mesplé's girlish gaiety.

On the other hand I just love the Spanish songs, some of which involve quite a lot of vocalises. It really is quite something to just induge yourself in the sensuous beauty of the voice as it winds its way through some of these melodies. The purity of the sound up high is breathtaking and yet there is richness down below too. I can't speak for the authenticity of her Spanish, but she is not afraid to adopt a snarlish chest voice in the lower regions.

It was a pleasure to reacquint myself with this lovely disc.
 
#242 ·


I was greatly impressed by Dresig's first two recitals and this Mozart disc does much too reinforce my first impressions.

As is often the case these days, recitals tend to have a "concept" and the x3 in the title refers to three heroines from each of Mozart's three Da Ponte operas plus three arias from three opera seria. Thus we have arias for the Countess, Susanna and Cherubino, Donna Anna, Donna Elvira and Zerlina, Fiodriligi, Dorabella and Despina and for Elettra, Cecilio (from Lucio Silla) and Vitellia.

Dreisig's voice is a full, lyric soprano with a deliciously smokey middle register and free and easy top. She is soon to sing Salome and has already recorded the final scene in French on her first recital disc.

Many Mozart recitals can tend to the samey or the bland, but that is certainly not the case here. I would suggest she is, by nature, a Countess rather than a Susanna, but her Deh vieni is deliciously seductive, whilst her Dove sono is dignified in her sadness and her Cherubino already on the way to becoming a practiced seducer. She is also more of an Elvira than an Anna, and indeed she has recently sung Elvira on stage. The recitative teems with drama, and indeed all the recitatives are delivered with a keen sense of their dramatic function. Anna's Non mi dir is nonetheless beautifully sustained. She phrases on and into the reprise of Non mi dir and the coloratura holds no terrors for her at all. Her Zerlina makes less of an impression for some reason, but her Despina is nicely contrasted to the two sisters, who are each given different voice characters.

I was really impressed by her Vitellia too, which is vividly alive and I really liked her dips into chest register.

Dreisig only recently turned 31. I hope we get to hear a good deal more of her.
 
#243 ·


I was greatly impressed by Dresig's first two recitals and this Mozart disc does much too reinforce my first impressions.

As is often the case these days, recitals tend to have a "concept" and the x3 in the title refers to three heroines from each of Mozart's three Da Ponte operas plus three arias from three opera seria. Thus we have arias for the Countess, Susanna and Cherubino, Donna Anna, Donna Elvira and Zerlina, Fiodriligi, Dorabella and Despina and for Elettra, Cecilio (from Lucio Silla) and Vitellia.

Dreisig's voice is a full, lyric soprano with a deliciously smokey middle register and free and easy top. She is soon to sing Salome and has already recorded the final scene in French on her first recital disc.

Many Mozart recitals can tend to the samey or the bland, but that is certainly not the case here. I would suggest she is, by nature, a Countess rather than a Susanna, but her Deh vieni is deliciously seductive, whilst her Dove sono is dignified in her sadness and her Cherubino already on the way to becoming a practiced seducer. She is also more of an Elvira than an Anna, and indeed she has recently sung Elvira on stage. The recitative teems with drama, and indeed all the recitatives are delivered with a keen sense of their dramatic function. Anna's Non mi dir is nonetheless beautifully sustained. She phrases on and into the reprise of Non mi dir and the coloratura holds no terrors for her at all. Her Zerlina makes less of an impression for some reason, but her Despina is nicely contrasted to the two sisters, who are each given different voice characters.

I was really impressed by her Vitellia too, which is vividly alive and I really liked her dips into chest register.

Dreisig only recently turned 31. I hope we get to hear a good deal more of her.


Hadn't heard of her so went to check her out. To me, she sounds best in this recent clip which is nice, as rarely nowadays do I hear singers who improve over time. That said I would need to hear some more of her recent work to make a proper judgement. I would disagree with your suggestion that she is a full-lyric, she seems to be a lighter-lyric but sings with a much healthier amount of release than most of those singing lighter roles these days. She uses some chest voice too, and while I'm not entirely convinced by how she handles quieter moments, especially in the upper part of the voice, she is better than many lighter voices of recent years. But Salome? If this voice has been improving I can't imagine it will be long until we hit a decline if she's singing dramatic roles like that. It seems any lyric singer with a voice a degree fuller than a nasal thread of sound is always bound to be pushed in to heaver roles. She would be sensible to continue singing this repertoire which she is clearly fairly effective in.
 
#247 · (Edited)


Reviving this thread as I'm about to start sifting through my collection of vocal recitals, both operatic and Lieder,/Chanson/Song.

This all Berlioz recital was released twenty years now and is interesting as much for the repertoire as for the singing. Alagna gives us tenor arias from all Berlioz's operatic works, both Iopas and Enée from Les Troyens, Bénédict from Béatrice et Bénédict, Cellini from Benvenuto Cellini, as well as excerpts from La Damnation de Faust, L'enfance du Christ and Lélio, which also has Gérard Depardieu providing narration. Depardieu also contributes to a rarity here, the early Huits scènes de Faust, where Alagna sings a tenor version of Méphistophélès' Serenade, to the accompaniment of a guitar. Alagna's then wife, Angela Gheorghiu is brought in to sing the duet from La Damnation de Faust with Alagna.

Berlioz is one of my favourite composers and, having found the review I wrote in this very forum four years ago, I see I enjoyed it then too. My one criticism is that Alagna is recorded a bit too close, and the orchestra a bit too distantly.
 
#249 ·


Originally issued (in the UK at least) by EMI, this recital confirmed Baltsa's place as one of the most impressive singers of her generation. Whether in Rossini, Mozart, Donizetti, Mercadante, Verdi or Mascagni the singing is exciting and vibrant, with the voice almost seamless from top to bottom, with a biting chest voice and thrilling top register (the top note in the aria from La Favorita is a real stunner). You'd go a long way to hear singing as good as this these days.
 
#250 ·


Recorded 5 years after her first recital, I don't think this one is quite as successful. We start with Donizetti's Maria Stuarda, first Elisabetta's Act I aria and then Maria's Act II aria. Baltsa, who is an impressive Elisabetta on video, seems more suited to the imperious Queen, with her vaulting vocal line, than she is to the gentler contours of Maria's paean to nature.

She was a wonderful Dorabella and later a very funny Despina, but I wouldn't have thought her suited to Fiordiligi and the voice character just seems wrong to me, and Come scoglio is rather unevenly sung. She then completes her tryptich of Lady Macbeth arias. She is more comfortable in the scheming ambition of the Act I aria than she is in the Sleepwalking Scene, which lies a little higher and, yet again, convinces me that Lady Macbeth is not a mezzo role, even one with such a powerful upper register as Baltsa. To finish, we get Didon's Je vais mourir and Adieu fière cité from Les Troyens. I don't know if she ever sang the role on stage, but this performance leaves me in no doubt as to what a fine Didon she would have been.
 
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