There have been dozens of capable, and more than capable, recordings of Lohengrin. Among the most-often praised are the Sawallisch/Bayreuth (1962), Kempe (1963), Solti (1985), and Abbado (1991). Recording a major Wagner opera involves heavy costs that a record company may be unable to recoup.
Category: Recordings
Premiere Recording: Mayr’s Telemaco nell’isola di Calipso (1797)
No sooner had I drafted my review of
Simon Mayr’s Medea in Corinto,
A Verlaine Songbook
Back in the LP days, if a singer wanted to show some sophistication, s/he
sometimes put out an album of songs by famous composers set to the poems of one
poet: for example, Phyllis Curtin’s much-admired 1964 disc of Debussy and FaurÈ
songs to poems by Verlaine, with pianist Ryan Edwards (available now as a CD
from VAI).
Giovanni Simone Mayr: Medea in Corinto
The Bavarian-born Johann Simon Mayr (1763–1845) trained and made his career
in Italy and thus ended up calling himself Giovanni Simone Mayr, or simply
G. S. Mayr. He is best known for having been composition teacher to
Giuseppe Donizetti.
Matthias Goerne: Bach Cantatas for Bass
In this new release for Harmonia Mundi, German baritone Matthias Goerne
presents us with two gems of Bach’s cantata repertoire, with the texts of
both BWV 56 and 82 exploring one’s sense of hope in death. Goerne
adeptly interprets the paradoxical combination of hope and despair that
underpins these works, deploying a graceful lyricism alongside a richer, darker
bass register.
Gramophone Award Winner — Matthias Goerne Brahms Vier ernste Ges‰nge
Winner of the 2017 Gramophone Awards, vocal category – Matthias Goerne and Christoph Eschenbach – Johannes Brahms Vier ernste Ges‰nge and other Brahms Lieder. Here is why ! An exceptional recording, probably a new benchmark.
VÈronique Gens: Visions from Grand OpÈra
Ravishing : Visions, VÈronique Gens in a glorious new recording of French operatic gems, with HervÈ Niquet conducting the M¸nchener Rundfunkorchester. This disc is a companion piece to NÈËre, where Gens sang familiar Duparc, Hahn, and Chausson mÈlodies.
John Joubert’s Jane Eyre
Librettists have long mined the literature shelves for narratives that are ripe for musico-dramatic embodiment. On the whole, it’s the short stories and poems – The Turn of the Screw, Eugene Onegin or Death in Venice, for example – that best lend themselves to operatic adaptation.
Through Life and Love: Louise Alder sings Strauss
Soprano Louise Alder has had an eventful few months. Declared ‘Young Singer of the Year’ at the 2017 International Opera Awards in May, the following month she won the Dame Joan Sutherland Audience Prize at the BBC Cardiff Singer of the World.
A Master Baritone in Recital: Sesto Bruscantini, 1981
This is the only disc ever devoted to the art of Sesto Bruscantini (1919–2003). Record collectors value his performance of major baritone roles, especially comic but also serious ones, on many complete opera recordings, such as Il barbiere di Siviglia (with Victoria de los Angeles). He continued to perform at major houses until at least 1985 and even recorded Mozart’s Don Alfonso in 1991, when he was 72.