What are you listening to?

[Jose Echenique]

Let´s start Verdi Year with one of his, or anyones, greatest operas. In this sad times when Verdi and Wagner voices seem to have vanished, this live Otello from 1987 is a good reminder that not that long ago there were truly great voices that made the composer proud. Plácido Domingo may not have had the tenore drammatico quality of a Giovanni Martinelli, Mario del Monaco or Jon Vickers, but his slightly more lyrical voice had the dark color essential for the role, and his incomparable artistry and musicianship certainly fulfilled the role´s needs. Anna Tomowa-Sintow, one of Karajan´s favorite sopranos (mine too!) had a creamy but powerful lirico-spinto, ideal for Desdemona. Besides singing like an angel she also brings dignity to the role, many other sopranos play/sing the role like a dumb blonde, but not the great Tomowa-Sintow. Verdi baritones are as rare these days as a tyrannosaurus rex. Renato Bruson was the genuine article, his gorgeous, aristocratic voice was a thing of rare beauty, and he can play a nasty guy too.
Zubin Mehta conducts very well, of course Claudio Abbado or Riccardo Muti would have been preferable, but Mehta rises to the challenge of conducting this fabulous cast.
The ORF sound is clean and well defined. Compared to this, the most recent recording of Otello, Colin Davis with the LSO in the LSO label is a joke. The tenor, Simon O´Neill, sounds 3 sizes too small for the role (he was a late replacement for an indisposed tenor, but then why release the recording?). Only the Iago, the bass-baritone Gerald Finley is actually acceptable, though he is not a Verdi singer by nature, certainly not one to compete with Renato Bruson.

[Seán]

Let´s start Verdi Year with one of his, or anyones, greatest operas. In this sad times when Verdi and Wagner voices seem to have vanished....

Our friends across the Irish Sea are more enlightened than most:

BBC Radio 3 celebrates three opera greats in their anniversary years:

Wagner 200 / Verdi 200 / Britten 100

BBC Radio 3 will broadcast the operas of Wagner, Verdi and Britten in 2013, showcasing over 140 hours of opera and allowing audiences the opportunity to hear the entire opera catalogues of the three composers in the anniversary year of their births.

Throughout the year Radio 3 will broadcast recordings from opera houses across the globe, including The Met, the Royal Opera House, English National Opera, Vienna State Opera, La Scala and from the Aldeburgh Festival, among others. Saturday’s Opera on 3 will broadcast many of these recordings and live performances while much of the remaining opera programming will fall in Thursday’s Afternoon on 3 Opera Matinee slot. Around the composer anniversary dates further programming will supplement the opera broadcasts with shows including Music Matters, The Essay, Sunday Feature, CD Review and Drama on 3 all delving into the work and lives of the three composers.

BBC Radio 3’s Verdi exploration begins on Sunday 6 January in the Sunday Feature slot with ‘Viva Verdi’, a programme dedicated to the composer’s work and its relationship to 19th century Italian society. Professor Roger Parker explores Verdi’s so-called ‘Risorgimento’ operas and explodes some of the myths around the music. The feature includes contributions from, among others, conductor Sir Mark Elder, director Graham Vick and commentator Tim Parks. It marks the start of Verdi’s anniversary month, which continues with the broadcast of five of the composer’s operas (I Lombardi, I Verspri Siciliani, Simon Boccanegra, Il Trovatore and Un Giorno di Regno).

The first Benjamin Britten opera of the season is the acclaimed 2012 English National Opera production of Billy Budd (26 January). Further Britten highlights include Peter Grimes, live from Aldeburgh Festival (7 Jun) and a new jazz commission from Guy Barker for the BBC Concert Orchestra and the Guy Barker Big Band, which draws on a Henry James short story and features characters from Britten’s operas (12 June). Britten’s Gloriana will be broadcast live from the Royal Opera House (29 June) while a new drama by Mark Ravenhill, Britten’s Gloriana, follows the composer as he struggled to fulfil the original commission for the opera (Drama on 3, 30 June).

Live broadcasts of Wagner’s operas include Parsifal, with Jonas Kaufmann in the title role (2 March), Das Rheingold (6 April), Die Walkure (13 April), Siegried (20 April) and Gotterdammerung (11 May), all broadcast Live from the Met, as well as Lohengrin, broadcast live from the Welsh National Opera conducted by their Music Director Lothar Koenigs (26 May).

Every opera transmission will include an introduction which will further explore the themes and issues around each work. These BBC Radio 3 Opera Guides will be available to download free via the BBC Radio 3 website after each broadcast.

Roger Wright, Controller BBC Radio 3 and Director, BBC Proms, says: “As the home of classical music, BBC Radio 3 will make 2013 a year to remember for all opera lovers. For the first time in the station’s history we will be broadcasting in one year all the operas by Verdi, Wagner and Britten, three masters of the genre, as well as providing unique contextual programming and downloadable guides for each work”.

[Jose Echenique]

Good for BBC 3!

Of course it´s a sad thing that this, of all of years of celebrations, happens in the middle of a World crisis, especially in Europe. One can only remember the lavish celebrations for Mozart Year in 1991.

[Jose Echenique]

Each new recording with the Belgian group Les Muffatti is an event, and now we are treated to some Jean-Marie Leclair violin concertos with Brazilian virtuoso Luis Otavio Santos, who has made of Leclair´s violin music a specialty.
These Italianate concertos are so immediately likable that it´s hard to understand why they haven´t been recorded more often. Simon Standage has recorded some for CHANDOS, and Daniel Cuiller leader of the Ensemble Stradivaria is the only violinist who has recorded all of them, but Santos easily eclipses both with playing of the utmost refinement and variety. Les Muffatti needless to say, offer luxury class support.

[jaybee]

Let´s start Verdi Year with one of his, or anyones, greatest operas. In this sad times when Verdi and Wagner voices seem to have vanished, this live Otello from 1987 is a good reminder that not that long ago there were truly great voices that made the composer proud. Plácido Domingo may not have had the tenore drammatico quality of a Giovanni Martinelli, Mario del Monaco or Jon Vickers, but his slightly more lyrical voice had the dark color essential for the role, and his incomparable artistry and musicianship certainly fulfilled the role´s needs. Anna Tomowa-Sintow, one of Karajan´s favorite sopranos (mine too!) had a creamy but powerful lirico-spinto, ideal for Desdemona. Besides singing like an angel she also brings dignity to the role, many other sopranos play/sing the role like a dumb blonde, but not the great Tomowa-Sintow. Verdi baritones are as rare these days as a tyrannosaurus rex. Renato Bruson was the genuine article, his gorgeous, aristocratic voice was a thing of rare beauty, and he can play a nasty guy too.
Zubin Mehta conducts very well, of course Claudio Abbado or Riccardo Muti would have been preferable, but Mehta rises to the challenge of conducting this fabulous cast.
The ORF sound is clean and well defined. Compared to this, the most recent recording of Otello, Colin Davis with the LSO in the LSO label is a joke. The tenor, Simon O´Neill, sounds 3 sizes too small for the role (he was a late replacement for an indisposed tenor, but then why release the recording?). Only the Iago, the bass-baritone Gerald Finley is actually acceptable, though he is not a Verdi singer by nature, certainly not one to compete with Renato Bruson.

Have you seen the footage of Levine coaching Placido for Othello? He was convinced that if he sang othello is would destroy his voice and thus career, but Domingo was unshakeable; he was going to sing the part. So, Levine says, if you're going to do it, you're doing it with me. He trained for months, and it made him!

[bombasticDarren]

Tchaikovsky - Orchestral Suite No.3 & Festival Coronation March (Gennady Rozhdestvensky, The USSR Ministry of Culture Symphony Orchestra, Erato)

[bombasticDarren]

Schumann - Symphony No.2 (Roy Goodman, The Hanover Band, RCA)

[bombasticDarren]

Debussy - Prelude a l'apres-midi d'un faune & La Mer (Jos van Immerseel, Anima Eterna, Zig-Zag Territoires)

[Jose Echenique]

Let´s start Verdi Year with one of his, or anyones, greatest operas. In this sad times when Verdi and Wagner voices seem to have vanished, this live Otello from 1987 is a good reminder that not that long ago there were truly great voices that made the composer proud. Plácido Domingo may not have had the tenore drammatico quality of a Giovanni Martinelli, Mario del Monaco or Jon Vickers, but his slightly more lyrical voice had the dark color essential for the role, and his incomparable artistry and musicianship certainly fulfilled the role´s needs. Anna Tomowa-Sintow, one of Karajan´s favorite sopranos (mine too!) had a creamy but powerful lirico-spinto, ideal for Desdemona. Besides singing like an angel she also brings dignity to the role, many other sopranos play/sing the role like a dumb blonde, but not the great Tomowa-Sintow. Verdi baritones are as rare these days as a tyrannosaurus rex. Renato Bruson was the genuine article, his gorgeous, aristocratic voice was a thing of rare beauty, and he can play a nasty guy too.
Zubin Mehta conducts very well, of course Claudio Abbado or Riccardo Muti would have been preferable, but Mehta rises to the challenge of conducting this fabulous cast.
The ORF sound is clean and well defined. Compared to this, the most recent recording of Otello, Colin Davis with the LSO in the LSO label is a joke. The tenor, Simon O´Neill, sounds 3 sizes too small for the role (he was a late replacement for an indisposed tenor, but then why release the recording?). Only the Iago, the bass-baritone Gerald Finley is actually acceptable, though he is not a Verdi singer by nature, certainly not one to compete with Renato Bruson.

Have you seen the footage of Levine coaching Placido for Othello? He was convinced that if he sang othello is would destroy his voice and thus career, but Domingo was unshakeable; he was going to sing the part. So, Levine says, if you're going to do it, you're doing it with me. He trained for months, and it made him!

Plácido actually sang the role for the first time with Carlos Kleiber, at the opening of the 1975-1976 season at La Scala. That was, UNBELIEVABLY, the FIRST color broadcast on Italian TV!!!! (we have had color TV in Mexico since 1968, for the Olympic Games).
There were good reasons to think that Domingo was not an Othello by nature, as I said he had the dark baritonal color for the role, but he didn´t have the guns of Francesco Tamagno or Giovanni Martinelli, and yet he sang the role brilliantly from the mid-seventies until well past year 2000.

[bombasticDarren]

Schubert - Symphony No.1 & No.2 (Marc Minkowski, Les Musiciens du Louvre, Naive)