Respighi: Nebbie

Teresa Berganza is undoubtedly one of the greatest Spanish singers of the 20th century. She enchanted audiences in opera houses around the world. Throughout her career, she would give recitals of songs, especially the songs of her homeland. This recital includes songs by Haydn, Fauré, Respighi, Braga and Rossini.

In addition to Luciano Pavarotti’s brilliant career on the opera stage, he was also known for his immensely popular recital performances featuring art song and lieder. This double-album features 24 recordings made at the peak of his career, ranging through works by Donizetti, Rossini, Bellini, Mascagni, and the rather less obvious Legrenzi, Liszt and Respighi as well as Giordani’s ‘Caro mio ben’, Beethoven’s ‘In Questa Tomba Oscura’, and Schubert’s ‘Ave Maria’. This is one of a series of five archive recordings of the legendary tenor being released by the American label Opera d’Oro over the next couple of months.

Sara Mingardo is that rare bird, the true contralto, and has just won the prestigious Premio Abbiati 2010 as best Italian singer.

Here she interprets works by Respighi that date from 1869 and 1914, and as such are often underestimated by critics and audiences, as pieces that anticipate Respighi’s successful creative period. The first nine pieces are very short, with lyrics by Ada Negri and Carlo Zangarini. In addition, ‘Pietà ti prenda, mio Dio’, is a transcription for voice, violin and piano from St Matthew Passion, a paraphrase of Psalm 51.

Sara Mingardo studied in her hometown Venice at the Academy Benedetto Marcello and first came to prominence by winning the Giulietta Simionato Prize at the 23rd Vienna Competition and the first prize at the Competition Toti dal Monte in 1987. Today Sara is an established figure in concert halls and opera houses in repertoire from Vivaldi to Britten. Her recent appearances at Covent Garden in Tamerlano, production by Graham Vick, marked her debut with The Royal Opera. She has already performed in the Royal Albert and Wigmore Halls and has established a relationship with the London Symphony Orchestra, appearing on their recordings of Messiah, Beethoven Mass in C, The Trojans and Beatrice & Benedict.

“Sara Mingardo is a shining exception, and the Venetian demonstrates with every performance the contralto beauties that the musical world is missing. Her voice is velvety smooth and beguilingly sensual, and she has a technique capable of tackling the most florid Baroque arias with grace.” The Times

This set includes the most famous recording of Alfredo Kraus, Lucia Alberti and Renato Bruson with arias by Bellini, Donizetti, Verdi, Mascagni etc. Also included are rare opera scenes such as Donizetti’s “Gemmy di Vergy” and Bellini’s “I Capuleti e I Montecchi. A highly recommended collection for fans of opera and these Belcanto artists.

This 5 CD set, devoted to the outstanding Italian baritone Tito Gobbi, is a further release in the EMI Classics ICON series. The bulk of this set is devoted to all the solo recordings that Gobbi made during his entire career, brought together for the first time.

The first CD begins with seven operatic arias (by Cilea, Leoncavallo, Mozart, Verdi and Puccini), and two songs (‘Musica proibita’ by Gastaldon and ‘Famme sunn’a cu’tte’ by Ruccione) that Gobbi made for the Italian branch of EMI in 1942. The songs were released only in Italy on a 78rpm record that had extremely limited circulation because of the Second World War, and are re-issued here by EMI for the first time.

The programme continues on CD 1 with further recordings that Gobbi made for EMI from 1948 onwards of operatic arias and songs, including two songs (‘La montanara’ and ‘Take the Sun’) that were featured in the 1949 film The Glass Mountain that brought the baritone to a wide cinema audience. He eventually appeared in more than 20 films.

CD 2 contains the rest of the songs and arias made up to the end of the 78rpm era, and finishes with the song ‘Nenia d’amore’ recorded in Italy in 1953 for the film Canzoni a due voci.

In 1955, Gobbi made his first LP recital album (with the forces of the Rome Opera), but it was not released at the time due to concerns about the technical quality of the recording. With the advance of technology the problems were subsequently able to be corrected and Gobbi later gave permission for material from the album to be released in various LP collections. The whole album is now heard here complete for the first time.

In 1964, EMI made a two-LP set called The Art of Tito Gobbi in which each of the four LP sides was devoted to a different genre, namely Operatic Arias, Classical Songs and Arias,

Italian and Neapolitan Popular Songs, and Romantic Songs. The programme repeated some of the repertoire on the as yet unpublished 1955 album but ranged much more widely, especially in the field of song. The operatic arias were made with the Philharmonia Orchestra under Alberto Erede; the classical songs with a small chamber ensemble consisting of harpsichord, cello and guitar; the popular songs with members of the Orchestra of the Rome Opera, and the romantic songs with the distinguished pianist Gerald Moore. This project marked the end of Gobbi’s recording career in solo repertoire.

The rest of the set covers extracts from some of the acclaimed complete opera recordings that Gobbi made for EMI, including Lucia di Lammermoor, Tosca, Aida and Rigoletto with the legendary soprano Maria Callas. Other operas featured are L’elisir d’amore, Simon Boccanegra, Don Carlo, Aida, Il tabarro, Il barbiere di Siviglia, Pagliacci and Gianni Schicchi. The programme ends with a memorable reminder of one of Gobbi’s finest assumptions, the title role in Verdi’s sublime Falstaff.