Marco Armiliato - DVD video

Production by David McVicar

David McVicar's acclaimed production employs a spectacular revolving set to bring a powerful new momentum to Verdi's dark drama of love and revenge. The opera features some of Verdi's best-loved music, including the Anvil Chorus and the heroic tenor aria Di quella pira.

Often described as requiring 'the four greatest singers in the world', this performance of Il Trovatore brings together a quartet of stars who have sung their roles to great acclaim throughout the world.

“Álvarez made a stalwart, passionate, masculine figure… Radvanovsky has all the technical devices necessary for Leonora, and she is, moreover, a passionate actress … Hvorostovsky sang with superb, flawless line, total control and long, flowing, high notes … Zajick held down Azucena powerfully … The opera’s end I have never seen staged or acted more convincingly” (Opera Today).

Picture format: 16:9

Subtitles: English, French, German, Spanish

Classification: Exempt

A star-studded benefit concert to celebrate Ioan Holender’s farewell after 19 years as the director of one of the world’s leading and most famous opera houses. The highly acclaimed cast was headed by brilliant singers such as Diana Damrau, Natalie Dessay, Angelika Kirchschlager, Waltraud Meier, Anna Netrebko, Pjotr Beczala, Plácido Domingo, Thomas Hampson, Leo Nucci, Thomas Quasthoff, Ramon Vargas and many others. No fewer than twelve conductors including Marco Armiliato, Bertrand de Billy, Fabio Luisi, Zubin Mehta, Antonio Pappano and Franz Welser-Möst led the way through a program lasting over four hours at the fully-packed Wiener Staastoper.

Subtitles: English, German, French, Spanish, Chinese

Angela Gheorghiu and Roberto Alagna star in the 2009 Metropolitan Opera production of Puccini’s La Rondine (The Swallow). This new production, directed by Nicholas Joël, was the company’s first staging in 70 years.

This elegant romance is the least-known work of the mature Giacomo Puccini. The story concerns a kept woman who defies convention to chase a dream of romantic love with an earnest, if naïve, young man. This Met Opera production features the dynamic soprano Angela Gheorghiu and Frenchborn tenor Roberto Alagna performing the roles of Magda and Ruggero, it blooms into its rightful place in the glorious Puccini canon.

La Rondine (The Swallow) was commissioned by Vienna’s Carltheater in 1913. Due to the impending outbreak of World War I, premiered in 1917, at the Opéra de Monte-Carlo with Gilda Dalla Rizza and Tito Schipa. Set in a Parisian salon, it is the story of Magda, the glamorous mistress of wealthy banker Rambaldo. Her yearning for romantic love compels her into the arms of the ardent and adoring young Ruggero.

The New York Times hailed the Art-Deco set production as “as sophisticated, charming and poignant”. This DVD features the 10th January, 2009 performance of the opera, which was aired globally in HD as well as two bonus interview featurettes: the first with Gheorghiu and Alagna; the second with Lisette Oropesa and Marius Brenciu, who sing the roles Lisette and Prunier respectively.

“Ms. Gheorghiu, as Magda, sings with gleaming sound and wonderfully dusky colorings…The conductor, Marco Armiliato, in what may be his best work to date at the Met, draws a nuanced and supple performance from the orchestra. I thought I knew this score quite well, but have never been so struck by the intricacies of the music”. The New York Times

“Mr Alagna supplied plenty of vocal and physical glamour and equal amounts of intelligent phrasing and text-reading; his boyish Ruggero was entirely sympathetic and very moving”. Classics Today

“I have never heard Alagna sing better, and Gheorghiu is at her sumptuous best. There are comparably beautiful performances by the younger couple, Marius Brenciu and Lisette Oropesa” New York Daily News

Bonuses:

Interview with Angela Gheorghiu & Roberto Alagna (3’35)

Interview with Lisette Oropesa & Marius Brenciu (4’21)

Having dazzled opera audiences from St. Petersburg to L.A. as Lucia, Anna Netrebko triumphantly returns to the Metropolitan Opera in this touchstone coloratura role. Mariusz Kwiecien’s Enrico delivers theatrical truth with a matchless baritone, the lustre of polished mahagony.

This Met performance of director Mary Zimmerman’s “imaginative staging . . . And nuanced portrayals” (Times) is a tour de force of music and theatricality.

STEREO: PCM / SURROUND: DTS 5.1

Picture Format: 16:9

Subtitles: Italian/German/English/French/Spanish/Chinese

“The greatest voices of their day came together again on Friday evening. . . Domingo still works his magic . . . Netrebko symbolizes the combination of skill, charisma and naturalness . . . Villazón is the perfect masculine counterpart. . . Great opera needs protagonists like these” (Die Welt am Sonntag, Berlin)