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Handel in England
14th May 2012
The Edinburgh-based Dunedin Consort record Esther, Christian Curnyn and the Early Opera Company make a fine case for the incidental music for Smollett’s Alceste, and a legendary Glyndebourne Theodora makes its first appearance on CD.
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Handel: Esther
Susan Hamilton (Esther), Nicholas Mulroy (Mordecai), Matthew Brook (Haman), Thomas Hobbs (1st Israelite), Robin Blaze (Priest), James Gilchrist (Habdonah / Assuerus) & Electra Lochhead (Israelite Boy), Nicholas Wearne (organ continuo) Dunedin Consort, John Butt
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Kathleen Ferrier
23rd Apr 2012
On the centenary of Ferrier’s birth, Katherine pays to tribute to the great Lancashire contralto and explores her legacy on disc via two comprehensive commemorative sets from Decca and EMI, which includes folksongs, Bach and Mahler.
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Kathleen Ferrier: The Complete EMI Recordings
Kathleen Ferrier (contralto), Gerald Moore (piano), Isobel Baillie (soprano), Elisabeth Schwarzkopf (soprano), Kathleen Ferrier (Orfeo), Greet Koeman (Euridice), Nel Duval (Amore) Wiener Philharmoniker, Wiener Symphoniker, Chorus & Orchestra of the Netherlands Opera, Bruno Walter, Herbert von Karajan, Charles Bruck
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New and forthcoming Opera DVDs
9th Apr 2012
Angela Gheorghiu and Jonas Kaufmann in Cilea's Adriana Lecouvreur from Covent Garden, Juan Diego Flórez, Diana Damrau and Joyce DiDonato in Rossini's Le Comte Ory from the Metropolitan Opera.
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Wagner - Klaus Florian Vogt and a new Parsifal
26th Mar 2012
The sweet-toned German tenor presents a portfolio of heavyweight heroes, whilst Marek Janowski’s Wagner cycle on Pentatone continues with a marvellously paced Parsifal, starring Christian Elsner as the ‘holy fool’.
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Jules Massenet - Werther & Don Quichotte
12th Mar 2012
Rolando Villazón brings apposite wildness and fragility to Goethe’s tortured poet, with Antonio Pappano presiding over a visceral, near-Italianate performance from the Covent Garden orchestra, whilst Ferruccio Furlanetto is heart-breaking as the ‘knight of the doleful countenance’ from the Mariinsky.
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Massenet: Werther
Rolando Villazon (Werther), Sophie Koch (Charlotte), Audun Iversen (Albert), Eri Nakamura (Sophie), Alain Vernhes (Le Bailli), Stuart Patterson (Schmidt), Darren Jeffrey (Johann), Anna Devin (Käthchen), Zhengzhong Zhou (Brühlmann) Chorus and Orchestra of the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, Antonio Pappano
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Aleksandra Kurzak and Renée Fleming
20th Feb 2012
Up-and-coming Polish soprano Kurzak radiates ‘gioia’ in her debut solo album of operatic arias by Donizetti, Bellini, Puccini and others, whilst Fleming is on ravishing form in an all-French programme of orchestral song-cycles by Ravel, Messiaen and Dutilleux (the latter composed for her in 2007).
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New Year’s Concert from Vienna
16th Jan 2012
Mariss Jansons presides over the celebrations for the second time in his career in a sparkling, imaginative-planned programme which includes two little nods to the forthcoming London Olympics as well as the perennial favourites by the Strauss Family, Ziehrer and Hellmesberger.
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Mariusz Kwiecień
9th Jan 2012
The charismatic Polish baritone’s debut solo album offers a compellingly sung and splendidly varied gallery of ‘Slavic Heroes’, including Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin and Mazeppa, Szymanowski’s King Roger, Rachmaninov’s Aleko and Borodin’s Prince Igor, as well as two arias from operas by his compatriot Moniuszko.
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Duetti da Camera: Philippe Jaroussky & Max Emanuel Cencic
21st Nov 2011
Two of today’s leading countertenors join forces with veteran baroque specialist William Christie for a programme of non-operatic secular duets by composers including Porpora, Mancini, Bononcini, Marcello, Conti, and Alessandro Scarlatti.
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Handel – Agrippina & Germanico
26th Sep 2011
Bulgarian soprano Alexandrina Pendatchanska is the scheming anti-heroine on René Jacobs’s terrific new recording of Agrippina, Max Cencic stars in Gluck’s Ezio and Vivaldi’s Farnace, and Sara Mingardo takes the title-role in the serenata Germanico, rediscovered in Florence in 2007.
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Lucia from the Mariinsky
1st Aug 2011
Natalie Dessay brings fragility and neurosis to the title-role, contrasting powerfully with Gergiev’s red-blooded Donizetti à la Verdi, Piotr Beczała’s ardent, ringing Edgardo and Vladislav Sulimsky’s black-voiced Enrico.
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Beethoven’s Fidelio from Abbado and Kaufmann
20th Jun 2011
The German tenor is mesmerising from his very first note, whilst Nina Stemme is scarcely less compelling as his heroic wife Leonore in this exhilarating live concert recording from last year’s Lucerne Festival.
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Handel's Ariodante
9th May 2011
Joyce DiDonato sings the title-role on Alan Curtis’s recording of Handel’s Scottish opera, with Marie-Nicole Lemieux as the dastardly Polinesso and Karina Gauvin as the woman they both love.
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Julia Lezhneva sings Rossini
18th Apr 2011
Katherine enjoys a hugely promising debut solo album from the Russian soprano (who was just nineteen when the recording was made), including arias from La cenerentola, La donna del lago and Guillaume Tell with Marc Minkowski and Sinfonia Varsovia.
