Felicity Palmer - DVD video

“…impressively cast, but in an overly stylised staging which reduces village life to milling dispiritedly beneath a vast black wall.” BBC Music Magazine, December 2008 ****

“...a fine performance, powerfully conducted by Donald Runnicles. In the title role Anthony Dean Griffey matches that power...with a tenor which is confidently firm and precise, matching his fine acting as a lumbering figure...Felicity Palmer as Mrs Sedley is vividly characterful.” Penguin Guide, 2010 **/*

“Reactions to Dawn French’s non-singing appearance as an ample and obdurate Duchess of Crackentorp will be, more than usual, a matter of taste...But there can surely be no argument about Dessay. As the regiment’s tomboy handmaiden Marie, pigtail curving, fist punching the air à la Nigel Kennedy, she shows incredible comic verve even when Donizetti’s music sends her voice skyrocketing. Singer, actress, clown: she’s all three. Theatrically, Flórez isn’t even near the same league...[but] the Peruvian star’s grin, sparkle and ringing tenor keep us happy enough. When the nine high Cs of Ah, mes amis! are hit dead in the centre with the ease of a shrug, you know you’re in safe hands. And Tonio suits exactly the singer’s still-boyish charm... It all makes you want to be in the stalls, seeing and breathing every moment.” The Times, 25th April 2008 ****

“Dessay… is such a natural clown, and it is wonderful to behold the way she used little bits of the coloratura to illustrate comic points. Bruno Campanella conducts the Royal Opera forces with a delicate understanding of all the requirements of Donizetti's often exquisite instrumental detail.” Gramophone Magazine, May 2008

“Laurent Pelly's production of Donizetti's opéra comique was one of the highlights of the Royal Opera's 2006-7 season, and viewing this well-produced DVD of the show it's perfectly obvious why. Natalie Dessay's skinny tomboy of a Marie combines a 110 per cent commitment to the physicality of her acting with a coloratura facility that is beyond criticism.” BBC Music Magazine, June 2008 *****

“Dessay establishes her star quality from her very first entry and vivaciously dominates Donizetti's delightful opera throughout...In short she is an unforgettably enchanting Marie, unlikely to be surpassed...[Florez] also sings and acts superbly.” Penguin Guide, 2011 edition

“If all opera DVDs were as successful as this 1985 Glyndebourne production of Albert Herring, a DVD guide would hardly be necessary...John Gunter's sets are imaginatively, charmingly real, and the casting could hardly be improved on...the whole show is conducted marvellously by Bernard Haitink. Moreover Peter Hall's direction is unerringly prescient. Excellent sound too.” Penguin Guide, 2010 ****

“The series was one of the last intelligent contributions to classical music by British television and, even by 1996, one suspects that only a musician of Rattle's stature and determination could have got it made… The line is unapologetically deterministic, the content confident enough to challenge: no room here for the second-rate or 'shamefully neglected'. The Tristan chord leads to the chromaticism of Elektra and inevitably to 12-tone music.” Gramophone Magazine, December 2005

“A notably stellar cast in Puccini's black comedy 'Gianni Schicchi'” BBC Music Magazine, Proms Issue 2005

“Glyndebourne has a first-rate lyric comedian in Alessandro Corbelli and a conductor who handles the music with feeling for its tenderness as well as its brio. The lovers, Sally Matthews and Massimo Giordano, bring fresh voices and good looks, and among the mean old relatives Felicity Palmer's brazen-voiced Zita is a joy. Small parts like the Notary's assistants the boy who brings the news that Gianni is on his way are played with relish, and even the corpse of Buoso Donati comes to life as he falls out of the cupboard where he has been bestowed and takes a brisk curtain-call at the end.” Gramophone Magazine, Awards Issue 2005

“Puccini's comic masterpiece comes in a production by Annabel Arden that determinedly underlines the black side of this sparkling farce...[Jurowski] also emphasizes that point...Corbelli proves a masterly Schicchi, at once characterful, funny and sinister” Penguin Guide, 2010 edition ***

“This transfer to DVD of a 1988 Virgin VHS houses an entirely recommendable staging by Lehnhoff for Glyndebourne. He directs his excellent cast with an astonishing ability to delineate their inner feelings, receiving the most positive response from Nancy Gustafson in the title-role. She presents, from her initial entry, an overwrought, highly impressionable girl frustrated beyond endurance by the casual attentions of her husband Tichon, and longing for the erotic charge offered by the attractive Boris.
When she finally capitulates to his advances, she mirrors the sense of release tinged with guilt evinced in the music. Her singing is firm, soaring, vibrant. Palmer is the very picture of buttoned- up severity as Kabanicha. Her command over Kát'á and Tichon is terrible to behold.
Davies suggests Tichon's lack of backbone.
McCauley's Boris conveys the man's ability to infatuate the repressed Kát'á. His tenor is keen, though under strain in the upper register.
Andrew Davis brings out all the passion and anguish in the wonderful score. Tobias Hoheisel's sets derive from Russian art of the period of the story's genesis.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“Graham Vick's 1992 staging is worthy of this extraordinary score. He reflects exactly the highly charged emotions and sense of brooding menace pervading the composer's re-enactment of Pushkin's story, thus creating a compelling psychodrama that compels both eye and ear. Davis catches most, if not all, of the score's romantic sweep and inner, dislocating turbulence, although the impassioned undercurrents are better achieved in the Kirov video, conducted by Gergiev (below). Yuri Marusin is the crazed Herman incarnate. Whether or not you can accept his often off-pitch singing is a personal matter. As his Lisa, Nancy Gustafson, offers a portrayal of an impressionable girl driven to distraction and suicide by the unhinged behaviour of her lover. She sings the part in warm, passionate tones.
Peter Maniura's video direction catches every facial expression of both characters and of Felicity Palmer's electrifying Countess. Sergei Leiferkus is elegant and commanding as the free-loving Tomsky. Dimitri Kharitonov is the soul of rectitude as Yeletsky and brings a bronzed tone to his lovely aria. Marie-Ange Todorovitch is an attractively palpitating Pauline.
Picture and sound are exemplary.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“[Yuri Marusin] is the part from beginning to end...Felicity Palmer's Countess is particularly fine. Andrew Davis holds all the threads together magnificently and gets an impressive response from his singers and the LPO.” Penguin Guide, 2010 edition **/***