Category: Recordings

In their attempt to recreate a combination of musical styles typical of fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Nürnberg, Schola Hungarica and its directors László Dobszay & Janka Szendrei have chosen selections from the Gänsebuch, described as the “only complete extant source for the pre-Reformation liturgy of the mass in Nürnberg.” [CD liner-notes, p. 3]

I never heard the 1966 live recording with Margherita Rinaldi and Paolo Montarsolo and I don’t
have a clue what the sound picture is like.

Two weeks before viewing these DVDís, I attended a performance of the same opera at De Vlaamse Opera in a new production by Ivo van Hove; Flemish boss of the most important Amsterdam theatre company.

With the distance of time, is it allowable to feel affection for Herbert von Karajan, beyond any respect — grudging or otherwise — for his long, starry career?

Recorded between 18 and 29 June 1984 at the Bayreuth Festspielhaus, this production of Richard Wagner’s Die Meistersinger von Nűrnberg makes a classic presentation of the opera available in a two-DVD set issued in 2006 by Deutsche Grammophon.

This concert was given on New Year’s eve in the year 2000, and the frail Claudio Abbado who
comes out to conduct makes for an alarming sight.

The booklet essay writer effuses passionately about this filmed Kalman operetta, Die Csárdásfürstin. Jürgen Otten gushes over the “immortal melodies,” Anna Moffo’s “precious jewel” of a voice, and Rene Kollo’s “innate nobility.”

Originally released by Deutsche Grammophon in 1976, this recording of selected songs by Sergei
Rachmaninov (1873-1943) and Mikhail Glinka (1804-57) make available some fine examples of
Russian art song to Western audiences.

Why should anyone buy a German language broadcast of a delicious French opéra-comique?

John Eliot Gardiner’s Bach Cantata Pilgrimage continues to echo with the release of concert
recordings of this historic millennial tour.