Offenbach: Barcarolle (from Les Contes d'Hoffmann ) (Belle nuit, ô nuit d'amour)

Sir Neville Marriner is one of the most versatile conductors of our time. Alongside his recordings of Baroque and Classical repertoire, he has also made a name for himself as an interpreter of Romantic orchestral music, as this compilation shows: it contains popular works from the highly colourful French and Russian repertoire, including new discoveries like Tchaikovsky's Barcarole, which can certainly hold a candle to the famous work of the same name by Offenbach, and the Berceuse by opera composer Benjamin Godard.

Karajan Adagio is the most successful classical collection of all time with nearly 4 million units sold since 1993. It has now been re-engineered, re-titled, and newly compiled for the 21st century.

“Adagio Karajan” was the ORIGINAL CLASSICAL CHILL-OUT ALBUM. Over two-and-a-half hours of the world’s most relaxing music – from the most accomplished conductor of all time. Emphasizing classical music’s unique power in transporting the listener away from the stresses and strains of modern-day living - All over the world, consumers are searching for an escape, and the soothing sounds of “Karajan Adagio” can provide that.

“Adagio” – the literal translation is “at ease”, with a slowness, with a tranquillity, and with a longing – the perfect antidote to the relentless pace of modern global living.

In October 1880, at the age of sixty-one, having poured out his high-spirited talent into over a hundred works for the stage, Offenbach lay exhausted on his deathbed. A strange figure wearing dark glasses and a floppy white cravat knocked at the door. It was Léonce, the comedian who had made such a big hit in Orphée aux enfers. The concierge told him: ‘Monsieur Offenbach is dead. He died very gently, without realising it’. ‘Well, well’, replied Léonce. ‘How annoyed he’ll be when he finds out.’

And that curious little anecdote, told by James Harding in his excellent liner notes, tells something of the wit and sparkling humour of these performances. Traversing a wide span of recordings – from Ernest Ansermet cheeky in the brilliantly-recorded overtures, to Sutherland and Crespin in voices thrilling and beguiling for the arias, this compendium offers not only the Offenbach ‘hits’ (including the Barcarolle from The Tales of Hoffman, both as an orchestral interlude as well as a duet), but several delightful rarities, performed by top-shelf Decca artists. Long out of print, the CD is now restored to circulation.

This magnificent collection features the some of the greatest opera stars of all time:

Cecilia Bartoli, Anna Netrebko, Bryn Terfel, Renée Fleming, Andrea Bocelli Luciano Pavarotti, Dame Joan Sutherland, Plácido Domingo, Dame Kiri Te Kanawa and José Carreras.

With a carefully chosen selection of perennially popular arias, duets and choruses, this enchanting collection creates the perfect introduction to opera.

With 40 tracks and over 2½ hours of music this collection is outstanding value for money.

Includes Pavarotti’s classic recording of the most popular opera aria of all, Puccini’s ‘Nessun dorma’.

Following the enormous success of the album OPERA 2009, EMI Classics is releasing OPERA 2010. Great voices of today and legendary singers of the past, from the EMI and Virgin Classics catalogue: the home of opera.

With 40 tracks, and over 2½ hours of operatic arias and duets, this double album features the best and most popular names in opera from the catalogues of both Virgin Classics and EMI Classics, ranging from the newest arrivals on the operatic scene, as well as many present day superstars, to iconic legends. This is an unmissable collection of the best in opera that will have a wide appeal.

Present day superstars include Angela Gheorghiu, Natalie Dessay, Sarah Brightman, Barbara Hendricks, Dame Kiri Te Kanawa, Jessye Norman, Placido Domingo, José Carreras, Rolando Villazón, Roberto Alagna and Bryn Terfel.

Rising new artists are strongly represented by Joyce DiDonato, Diana Damrau, Elina Garanca, Vivica Genaux, Véronique Gens, Patrizia Ciofi, Philippe Jaroussky, Jonas Kaufmann, David Daniels, Max Emanuel Cencic and Laurent Naouri.

The programme also contains tracks by some of the world’s greatest singers of the past such as Victoria de los Angeles, Teresa Berganza, Mirella Freni, Lucia Popp and Franco Corelli as well as the legendary Luciano Pavarotti and the unique Maria Callas.

All the most popular operatic composers are represented, from Baroque masters like Vivaldi, Rameau and Handel, through Gluck and Mozart to Bellini, Donizetti, Verdi, Puccini, Mascagni, Cilea and Gershwin, as well as French favourites Gounod, Massenet and Offenbach.

Since the beginning of opera, the convention of the duet, in which two characters simultaneously express their feelings, has been one of the staple ploys of musical dramatists. Characters may join their voices in a unity of feeling, or in extreme disagreement, or in any one of the thousand shades in between; though in the examples we have here, all involving the combination of soprano and mezzo-soprano voices, the feelings expressed are held in common between the two singers.