What are you listening to?

[Seán]

I have just finished listening to this set....





....it has been a while since I last heard it.
Back in the day when I bought this set it was one of the most expensive items in my collection (still is). The price has come down considerably since then. It remains my favoured Mahler cycle and is by far the best thing of Abbado in my collection also.

You still have to get ........all the Rossini operas.

Now, there's a thought! Into the ponder pouch ( viewtopic.php?f=5&t=2291 ) it goes, thanks Pepe.

[Seán]

I have just finished listening to this set....





....it has been a while since I last heard it.
Back in the day when I bought this set it was one of the most expensive items in my collection (still is). The price has come down considerably since then. It remains my favoured Mahler cycle and is by far the best thing of Abbado in my collection also.

You still have to get his Carmen, his Boris Godunov and all the Rossini and Verdi operas Fergus.

Pepe, are you referring to these two?

[Jose Echenique]

Of course Seán. Abbado has had a great recording career with symphony orchestras: his Brahms Second with the Berlin Philharmonic, The Alexander Nevsky with the LSO, the Schubert symphony cycle with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, and of course his outstanding Mahler recordings can be counted among some of his unmissable symphonic recordings, but it is in Opera that Abbado stands head and shoulders among conductors of his generation. His recordings of Barbiere and Cenerentola with Teresa Berganza are classics, his recording of the recently rediscovered Il Viaggio a Reims must be the best and the most valuable recording of the 1980´s. His superb Carmen also with Teresa Berganza is the finest ever, his Boris Godunov and Khovashchina put to shame all Russian recordings, and his incomparable, unmissable Verdi is the finest since Toscanini´s and de Sabata´s.
These recordings belong in every collection.

[Seán]

Of course Seán. Abbado has had a great recording career with symphony orchestras: his Brahms Second with the Berlin Philharmonic, The Alexander Nevsky with the LSO, the Schubert symphony cycle with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, and of course his outstanding Mahler recordings can be counted among some of his unmissable symphonic recordings, but it is in Opera that Abbado stands head and shoulders among conductors of his generation. His recordings of Barbiere and Cenerentola with Teresa Berganza are classics, his recording of the recently rediscovered Il Viaggio a Reims must be the best and the most valuable recording of the 1980´s. His superb Carmen also with Teresa Berganza is the finest ever, his Boris Godunov and Khovashchina put to shame all Russian recordings, and his incomparable, unmissable Verdi is the finest since Toscanini´s and de Sabata´s.
These recordings belong in every collection.

Thanks Pepe, I LOVE Abbado's work, he is one of my favourite conductors and is probably the best living exponent of his craft. I am totally unfamiliar with his operatic recordings so these two sets do interest me, particularly the Rossini collection.

[fergus]

I have just finished listening to this set....





....it has been a while since I last heard it.
Back in the day when I bought this set it was one of the most expensive items in my collection (still is). The price has come down considerably since then. It remains my favoured Mahler cycle and is by far the best thing of Abbado in my collection also.

You still have to get his Carmen, his Boris Godunov and all the Rossini and Verdi operas Fergus.

Groan!!!!

[fergus]

This evening I discovered Wagner’s Wesendonck Lieder.

The recording that I have is:

Wagner: Wesendonck Lieder
Kirsten Flagstad
Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra
Hans Knappertsbusch
Decca 10” Vinyl LW 5302


I must admit that the older I get the more that I am coming to appreciate the music of Wagner. This is simple but really lovely I think. Knowing the provenance of this music also makes it all the more interesting.

As a direct result of this I think that I will, in the near future, listen to Tristan and Isolde; the recording that I have is:

Kirsten Flagstad
Ludwig Suthaus
The Philharmonia Orchestra
Wilhelm Furtwangler
HMV 6x12” Vinyl ALP 1030-1035

I am sure that Pepe will tell me whether or not this is a worthwhile version of this opera.

[Jose Echenique]

Mercy!!!!

This is one of the finest recordings of ANYTHING ever made. Kirsten Flagstad & Wilhelm Furtwängler?

This is Heaven in Earth.

[Jose Echenique]

Even though there´s a little dirty secret to this recording. Kirsten Flagstad was already well over 50 when this recording was made in 1952, her high notes were not what they used to be, and in fact she was uneasy about a couple of high C´s during the big duet in act 2. Still, the great Walter Legge INSISTED that she recorded the role because he knew that history would condemn him if he didn´t record Tristan with the greatest Wagner conductor AND the greatest Wagner soprano of the 20th Century, so, she asked his wife Elisabeth Schwarzkopf to sing the 2 high C´s in the recording, this was going to be a secret but some tell-tell violinist from the Philharmonia Orchestra blew the whistle. Flagstad of course was very mortified, but really, who cares? She still sings a glorious Isolde even without those 2 high C´s courtesy of Dame Elisabeth Schwarzkopf.

[Jose Echenique]

Antonio Florio and his Cappella della Pietá de´Turchini introduced us to the glorious music of Francesco Provenzale about 15 years ago with their recording of the sacred opera La Colomba Ferita, a landmark recording when we basically had never heard a note of such XVII Century Neapolitan masters as Caresana and Provenzale.
Since then we have had several recordings of Provenzale´s religious works, but this is the first recording of a comic opera of his, and what a delicious treasure it is!
La Stellidaura Vendicante was composed to entertain the Spanish Viceroy of Naples, El Marqués de Astorga. The title role was sung, and composed for a most fascinating "entertainer" Giulia "La Ciulla" De Caro. I wonder if "ciulla" comes from the Spanish "chula", the pretty one. This woman was said to be extremely beautiful, and even though she started as an actress of straight theater, she later learned to sing and became even more famous as an opera singer. A contemporary chronicler described her as "commediante cantarinola, armonica puttana", or "actress, singer, diva, whore". Whatever her extra curricular activities she must have been an extremely intelligent and enterprising woman. She took a lease on the Teatro di San Bartlomeo the year before the premier of La Stellidaura Vendicante to open the first public opera house in Naples. She also received generous economic support for the theatre from the Viceroy and his brother-in-law, she was said to be the mistress of both! The jealous called the theatre Il Bordello Sostenuto, or the Subsidized Brothel.
La Stellidaura Vendicante was Provenzale´s last published work, the influence of Monteverdi and possibly Cavalli is evident, but Provenzale was a great composer in his own right and one already can hear Italian opera moving forward to Alessandro Scarlatti. Alessandro De Marchi who gave the first modern performance in 1997 knows everything about the score, and with 15 years´experience his conducting is masterly. But most important, like La Colomba Ferita this IS a masterpiece, one of those breathtakingly beautiful Neapolitan treasures that we are fortunate to hear for the first time in 300 years.

[Ciaran]

Antonio Florio and his Cappella della Pietá de´Turchini introduced us to the glorious music of Francesco Provenzale about 15 years ago with their recording of the sacred opera La Colomba Ferita, a landmark recording when we basically had never heard a note of such XVII Century Neapolitan masters as Caresana and Provenzale.
Since then we have had several recordings of Provenzale´s religious works, but this is the first recording of a comic opera of his, and what a delicious treasure it is!
La Stellidaura Vendicante was composed to entertain the Spanish Viceroy of Naples, El Marqués de Astorga. The title role was sung, and composed for a most fascinating "entertainer" Giulia "La Ciulla" De Caro. I wonder if "ciulla" comes from the Spanish "chula", the pretty one. This woman was said to be extremely beautiful, and even though she started as an actress of straight theater, she later learned to sing and became even more famous as an opera singer. A contemporary chronicler described her as "commediante cantarinola, armonica puttana", or "actress, singer, diva, whore". Whatever her extra curricular activities she must have been an extremely intelligent and enterprising woman. She took a lease on the Teatro di San Bartlomeo the year before the premier of La Stellidaura Vendicante to open the first public opera house in Naples. She also received generous economic support for the theatre from the Viceroy and his brother-in-law, she was said to be the mistress of both! The jealous called the theatre Il Bordello Sostenuto, or the Subsidized Brothel.
La Stellidaura Vendicante was Provenzale´s last published work, the influence of Monteverdi and possibly Cavalli is evident, but Provenzale was a great composer in his own right and one already can hear Italian opera moving forward to Alessandro Scarlatti. Alessandro De Marchi who gave the first modern performance in 1997 knows everything about the score, and with 15 years´experience his conducting is masterly. But most important, like La Colomba Ferita this IS a masterpiece, one of those breathtakingly beautiful Neapolitan treasures that we are fortunate to hear for the first time in 300 years.

Thanks Pepe, that's been on my radar for a while. It's encouraging me that you like it, though I do find a whole baroque opera a bit of a challenge, much as I enjoy individual arias.