Recently in Recordings
16 Mar 2006
The Nutcracker is one of the most popular ballets. Tchaikovsky’s score alone is synonymous with Christmas—one can even say that it is what keeps this ballet alive. »
16 Mar 2006
A critical aspect of Mahler’s music is the way the composer often juxtaposed the familiar and the new, and this dichotomy is reflected strongly in his Fourth Symphony. »
13 Mar 2006
Some opera sets are meant to be an introduction to the work presented. They contain a booklet which tells you about the life of the composer, the history of the work, some analysis, a synopsis of the story, and maybe (if you're lucky) the libretto translated into your language. »
10 Mar 2006
This recording features piano works by the pillars of nineteenth-century Romantic piano composition (Chopin and Liszt), the Spanish-speaking musical nationalists (Granados, Ginastera, and de Falla), and the Russian composer-pianists (Scriabin and Rachmaninov) who reinterpreted the Romantic spirit in new and innovative ways for the piano. »
10 Mar 2006
Mozart’s Requiem has become widely-known and popular since the 1984 movie Amadeus. Left incomplete at his death, his student and assistant Franz Xaver Sussmayr (1766-1803) completed the work from Mozart’s notes. »
10 Mar 2006
Could La Traviata be the opera with the most versions available on DVD? The appetite for the doomed heroine never wavers. »
09 Mar 2006
If Richard Wagner’s music may be seen to pervade the late nineteenth century, an area that is rarely discussed is his influence on song. »
08 Mar 2006
Everyone is familiar with the waltzes and polkas of the “Waltz King,” Johan Strauss II, along with his father Johann I and his brother Josef. »
08 Mar 2006
Verdi’s smash hit of 1844 is a relative rarity these days. As Stefano Olcese notes in his booklet essay for a new Dynamic recording, the opera calls for daunting vocal display from tenor, soprano, baritone, and bass. »
05 Mar 2006
The richness of the Ars Antiqua flourishing in Paris in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries marks the time as one of high cultural achievement, drawing nurture from the contemporaneous rise of the Cathedral of Notre Dame and the University of Paris. »
05 Mar 2006
It would be presumptuous of me to go through the entire plot of The Magic Flute, given its historical and popular significance with all classical music devotees. »
28 Feb 2006
This recording is a grouping of various compositions by J.S. Bach, which are not solely dedicated to the trumpet, but provide some of the most demanding repertoire for the instrument prior to the nineteenth century. »
22 Feb 2006
Vivaldi was very impressed with the sound and performances of the Dresden court orchestra when they visited Venice in 1716. »
22 Feb 2006
The tragic ravages of the Thirty Years’ War explicitly shaped the musical output of Heinrich Schütz. »
21 Feb 2006
Musicologists should be eager to welcome the “first modern recordings” of any work; surely having the opportunity to hear a long-lost musical treasure, rather than having it stare off the page in black-and-white, is something to be celebrated. »
21 Feb 2006
As the Vivaldi edition continues, Opus 111 is releasing a series of individual volumes dedicated to cantatas interspersed with other chamber works. »
17 Feb 2006
This recording is another gem from the Complete Vivaldi Edition, a collaboration of Naïve (opus 111) and various Piedmontese institutions [see this author’s review of Vivaldi’s Orlando in that series]. »
15 Feb 2006
Irish composer Gerald Barry insists that “Really, my music is very straightforward. »
13 Feb 2006
Nikolaus Lehnhoff’s Parsifal, first staged by English National Opera in 1999, is given on this Opus Arte DVD in a 2004 performance led by Kent Nagano at the Baden-Baden summer festival. »
11 Feb 2006
Henryk Górecki’s Symphony no. 3 (1976), his “Symphony of Sorrowful Songs,” as it is called, is one of the most popular recordings of late twentieth-century music. »
11 Feb 2006
Premiered in 1792 (just months after the death of Mozart), Il Matrimonio Segreto won over Vienna from the start, and Domenico Cimarosa’s opera would remain his most popular work. »
09 Feb 2006
The religious turmoil of sixteenth-century England was characterized not only by factionalism and polarity, but also famously by the charting of a via media, a middle path, through opposing views. »
05 Feb 2006
The late Gary Bertini (1927-2005) was noted for his fine interpretations of Mahler’s work, and his cycle with EMI was esteemed highly. An accomplished musician, Bertini founded the Israeli Chamber Orchestra in 1965, and later become chief conductor of the Jerusalem Symphony. »
04 Feb 2006
This 2005 release was filmed at a performance in La Scala’s temporary home, Milan’s Teatro degli Arcimboldi, in April 2004. It is based on the Burmeister version of the ballet of some 50 years ago, first introduced in the West by the Paris Opera. »
03 Feb 2006
It has been nearly thirty years since the centenary production of the Ring at Bayreuth, and the controversy and even scandal that it generated have long since faded into memory. »
02 Feb 2006
The symphonies of Anton Bruckner deserve excellent performances to convey the intensity that the composer intended for them, and sometimes an individual performance can offer the opportunity to understand them more clearly. »
01 Feb 2006
Handel went to London as a free-lance musician – i.e., “on his own bottom” – in autumn 1710. His Rinaldo of February 1711, with its dazzling arias and scenic spectacles, was resoundingly successful. »
29 Jan 2006
Inspired by the elitist poets of late nineteenth century Paris, Debussy was eager to join their ranks by developing musical ideas that evoked the same emotional response as the poetry he admired. Originally, Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune was a collaborative project between Debussy and Stéphane Mallarmé, a poet highly regarded by the composer. »
29 Jan 2006
Perhaps instead of waiting for the next great new opera, focus should be on finding the next great opera composer. »
27 Jan 2006
Clearly someone at Naxos loves Rossini. The label only recently released a good Cenerentola with the most excellent Joyce Di Donato, and the back catalog contains many titles, including highly praised sets of Barbieri (with Ramon Vargas) and Tancredi (featuring Ewa Podles). »
26 Jan 2006
I wonder if a record company, any record company, would have taken the trouble of recording these songs if the composer had been Zoltan Kocsis or Deszö Ranki instead of Imre (his real first name) Kálmán? »
26 Jan 2006
Known for his virtuosity as a pianist, Ignacy Paderewski (1860-1941) is also known as a composer. While most of his works involve piano, he left a single opera, Manru, a three-act work that he composed between 1892 and 1901. »
26 Jan 2006
Two of Finland’s greatest artistic luminaries—composer Aulis Sallinen (b. 1935) and poet Lassi Nummi (b. 1928)—came together to produce a fine new work, The Barabbas Dialogues (2004), which has been recently recorded and released on CD on the CPO label. »
25 Jan 2006
In an era where new studio recordings by major orchestras have dwindled to a pathetic dribble, leaving many fine institutions to start their own in-house labels, the Berlin Philharmonic still has an active contract with a major company (its conductor’s label of many years, EMI) and releases come on a regular basis. A recent one features some of Benjamin Britten’s great work for instruments and tenor. »
24 Jan 2006
“Carmen, un bon conseil” warns Frasquita in the last act of the opera. So friends, heed my advice and don’t play this CD in your car when you are accompanied by someone who likes opera but is not crazy on lieder. »
24 Jan 2006
It is now slightly over 40 years since the first recording of a complete opera by Saverio Mercadante (an Il Giuramento with Maria Vitale and Amedeo Berdini) was released on LP. I quickly fell in love with his music, and realized that, while not necessarily on the same level as Bellini and Donizetti, he was not far behind, and that more of his works would be extremely welcome. »
22 Jan 2006
On June 3, 1875, thirty-six year old Bizet died after having one, some say two, heart attacks preceded by other complications. Legend has it that the composer's death was hastened by the failure of his latest work, Carmen. »
19 Jan 2006
In 1981 Wilhelminia Fernandez became somewhat of a cult figure when the French thriller “Diva” appeared on the screens. For a time her “Ebben, ne andro lontano” from La Wally almost became a hit and several commercials used a small part of the aria. »
18 Jan 2006
So EMI has declared this 1988 Porgy and Bess to be one of the “Great Recordings of the Century.” That may settle the issue for many – but not all. »
17 Jan 2006
It must not have been an easy life, being Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791). Perhaps even more so after the fact when scholars began to do their research and “wanna bes” began their intimations and psychoanalyzing. In the more seventy-five years of Mozart scholarship and its coming of age, one must ask: How much more is there to learn, to research? »
16 Jan 2006
It is not uncommon for opera on DVD to have credits for two directors. In the case of this Paris Capriccio, a new production from June 2004, the credits list Robert Carsen as the stage director and Francois Roussillon as directing for TV and video. »
16 Jan 2006
Under the direction of James O’Donnell since January 2000, the Choir of Westminster Abbey has cultivated a robust singing style that well serves the music of this new recording and continues the Abbey’s position as one of the obvious standard bearers of the English cathedral tradition. »
14 Jan 2006
At 73 minutes, this DVD of the typical gala affair – various soloists trot on, sing an aria, then trot off – can’t be called generous, but it does have variety. »
14 Jan 2006
When you and I were young Maggie, there was only the fine Werther with Thill and Vallin and the Cetra recording with Tagliavini and his first wife, Pia Tassinari. »
14 Jan 2006
I suspect that when we survey the musical landscape of the early seventeenth century, it is opera, monody, and madrigal that come most quickly and lastingly into view, and given the contemporaneous attention given to the relationship between music and word, it is unsurprising that this would be the case. »
