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See Terms & Conditions for p&p rates. | |  | Bellini: La SonnambulaRecorded October, 2008 – Cagliari (I)
Simone Alaimo (Il Conte Rodolfo), Eglise Gutierrez (Amina), Antonino Siragusa (Elvino), Sandra Pastrana (Lisa), Gabriella Colecchia (Teresa), Gabriele Nani (Alessio) & Max René Cosotti (Un notaro) Orchestra & Chorus Teatro Lirico di Cagliari, Maurizio Benini (conductor) & Hugo De Ana (director) La sonnambula (The Sleepwalker) is an opera semiseria in two acts, with music in the bel canto tradition by Vincenzo Bellini. This 2008 production was staged by Hugo de Ana at the Teatro Lirico di Cagliari. The references to 17th century Romantic painting and refined visual projections are a tribute to Luchino Visconti. Visconti produced the memorable performance of La Sonnambula at the Scala di Milano with the magnificent Maria Callas. Simone Alaimo is one of Italy’s best bass-baritones and Antonino Siragusa is a very experienced performer of Rossini and Bellini operas. The role of Amina is sung by the rising star of the International world, Eglise Gutierrez. Eglise Gutierrez made her debut at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden in 2009 as Linda di Chamounix and was praised by The Times for her “exceptional singing”. The Telegraph said she had “a curious voice…but with stratospheric notes that penetrate like rays of brilliant sun.” Sound format: LPCM 2.0 Picture format: 16:9 Region Code: 0 Running Time: 141 mins Booklet notes: IT/EN/FR/GER Subtitles: FR/EN/GER/SP/IT Available Worldwide “This performance of Bellini's lovely opera from Sardinia has a superb Amina in Eglise Gutierrez, the finest since Callas” BBC Music Magazine, May 2011 *** “This is not a perfect Sonnambula, but visually it's as lovely as can be imagined... for [Gutierrez] alone the DVD is a 'must'. [She] is a true lyric-coloratura, with luscious warmth in the lower middle but also a glittering extension beyond high C. Vocally she has every requirement for Amina...Maurizio Benini brings his considerable experience to the fore, leading a confident and stylistically astute performance.” International Record Review, April 2011 | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Bellini: La Sonnambula
Bellini's romantic opera 'La sonnambula' (1831), hinges on the love and misunderstanding between Elvino and Amina (the ‘sleepwalker’ of the title). Discovered in the bedroom of Rodolfo, Amina is assumed to have been unfaithful, and Elvino cancels their wedding. But in the dramatic final scene, he witnesses Amina sleepwalking, understands her innocence, and all ends happily. Mary Zimmerman's production plays with the dual realities of a rehearsal of the opera and a performance of the opera itself. In his latest Decca DVD release, bel canto star Juan Diego Flórez assumes the role of Elvino in Bellini’s romantic drama, playing opposite the mercurial French soprano, Natalie Dessay, in the MET’s striking, modern-dress production, screening live worldwide in March 2009. The MET’s ‘La Sonnambula’ website reads: “Mary Zimmerman, who directed Natalie Dessay in last season’s hit new production of Lucia di Lammermoor, underlines La Sonnambula’s dual elements of sleep and wakefulness in an intriguing staging set in the present. Bellini’s hauntingly lyrical score soars as performed by Dessay and Juan Diego Flórez, back from their sensational run together in La Fille du Régiment in leading opera houses around the world.” The DVD release will benefit from the addition of the customary MET backstage and interview footage, familiar to devotees of their live worldwide cinema broadcasts. Following Flórez's latest DVD release (Cenerentola, in October 2009), 2010 will also see a second Flórez DVD – Bellini’s ‘I Puritani’, with Nino Machaidze, from Bologna. Filmed in High Definition Widescreen. SUBTITLES: English, French, German, Spanish, Chinese PICTURE FORMAT: 16:9 (anamorphic widescreen), Colour, NTSC, Region code 0 (worldwide) SOUND FORMAT: LPCM Stereo & DTS 5.1 Surround (DVD) BONUS FEATURE: 'Backstage at the MET', presented by Deborah Voigt, featuring interviews with Dessay and Flórez “The role of Amina holds no terrors for Natalie Dessay...you wonder how it could be sung any other way. As Elvino, Juan Diego Flórez is richer in tone than in recent performances and you feel the violence ignited by his sexual jealousy. In the pit, Evelino Pidò is everything you need” BBC Music Magazine, July 2010 *** “[The rehearsal conceit] may sound like a straight thumbs-down. But it works....almost without knowing it, one is drawn into the work itself, rejoicing in the power of song...Juan Diego Flórez has an abundance of all that is required and enjoys a well-deserved ovation after his solo in Act 2...Evelino Pidò conducts with judicious flexibility.” Gramophone Magazine, July 2010 | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Bellini: La Sonnambulastandard edition
The two leading bel canto super stars of today, Cecilia Bartoli and Juan Diego Flórez join forces for the first time in the most complete and authentic recording of Bellini's La sonnambula - an eagerly awaited moment in the operatic world and a must have item for all Fans of Bartoli and Florez. This brand new studio recording is the perfect package for Christmas 2008, and is Decca's core classical top priority for the autumn. Supported by a continued global tour covering Europe, Japan and America, this release finishes off the festival of celebrations for the bicentenary year of Maria Malibran (1808-1836). It is the first ever recording with a 'mezzo-soprano' in the lead role, and the first ever recording with a period instrument orchestra. Many of the cadenzas sung by Cecilia Bartoli are those used by the great 19th Century interpreter of the role, Maria Malibran. | Decca - 4781087 (CD - 2 discs) Normally: $26.00 Special: $21.00 |
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| |  | Bellini: La Sonnambula
“This is a lively, alert Sonnambula. Natalie Dessay is a particularly wakeful Amina, bright-voiced in the French tradition, sensitive and intelligent… Even so, there is not a great deal of imagination in the singing until it comes to the final aria, "Ah, non credea mirarti", and there Dessay does indeed give a most lovely performance, singing with deep feeling and warm tone.” Gramophone Magazine, Janurary 2008 “Evelino Pidò conducts magnificently. Quite simply, Natalie Dessay is the most accomplished and the most affecting Amina on record since Callas.” BBC Music Magazine, December 2007 ***** “Bellini's delightful jeu d'esprit on the theme of sleepwalking is splendidly realised in this skilled production. Natalie Dessay is in commanding form as Amina, gracefully scaling and descending the concluding passage of "Sovra il sen la man mi posa" and combining beautifully with Francesco Meli's Elvino for exquisite duets of "D'un pensiero e d'un accento" and the gently mannered "Vedi, o madre, è afflitto e mesto".” The Independent, 20th February 2009 ***** “Supreme Natalie. She was the pretext to this Sonnambula performed in concert version at the Opéra de Lyon and later at the Théâtre des Champs Elysées in Paris. Natalie Dessay, all radiance, virtuosity and musicality most naturally triumphed in a repertoire where she has few equals in this day. Not to mention Evelino Pidò’s superb conducting” Altamusica.com | | | In stock - usually despatched within 1 working day. |
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| |  | Bellini: La Sonnambula
This performance was recorded on 25th October 1960 at Covent Garden and is a unique live document, released in honour of Joan Sutherland. | | | Usually despatched in 2 - 3 working days. |
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| |  | Bellini: La Sonnambula1957 Recording
Visconti’s sensational 1955 production of La Sonnambula for La Scala, Milan, was revived and recorded two years later. As a girl, Callas had fallen in love with the role of Amina; as an adult it suited her voice perfectly, and her interpretation set a benchmark that few have equalled. Among the many highlights of Callas’s profoundly satisfying performance is her cadenza for Ah non giunge in which she executes a remarkable diminuendo on a stratospheric E-flat, a feat unrivalled in the history of the gramophone. This is by any standards a classic recording. “Callas does not appear to ever strain for a note. Her voice is always agile and flexible, with an upper register that is forceful but transparent. Callas always retains her lyric sweetness, She sings with nearly perfect evenness through passages of florid ornamentation.” Audiophile Audition on this recording | | | (also available to download from $16.50) | Usually despatched in 2 - 3 working days. (Available now to download.) |
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| |  | An Introduction to Bellini's La Sonnambula
Bellini: | La Sonnambula An introduction to the Opera |
12-page booklet Written by Thomson Smillie This audiobook series introduces, in words and music, the plot and background of major operas. Using the principal themes and arias, taken from the Naxos recordings of the complete works, the presentation is informative yet entertaining, enabling the listener to get more from this remarkable art form. La sonnambula was written by Bellini as a vehicle for two of the supreme singers of his age and accordingly is a fine example of the school we call bel canto, where beauty of voice and the virtuosity of the singers is integral to conveying the emotions in the soul of the composer. The fact that Bellini was one of the great melodists, writing long, beautiful vocal lines, that he was a master orchestrator and that he could write stirringly for the chorus all conspire to make La sonnambula an extremely enjoyable example of Italian opera in its prime. | | | (also available to download from $6.00) | Usually despatched in 2 - 3 working days. (Available now to download.) |
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| |  | Bellini: La Sonnambula
At her début in the role of Amina in 1955, Callas dominated the ensembles and, at certain moments, she showed her vocal power off with hardly concealed pride. Her powers may have diminished a little in the two and a half years that passed since that time, but in Edinburgh her interpretation of the role had significantly deepened. Her Amina is less girl, less naïve, and less imbued with echoes of her immediate predecessors in the role, Lina Pagliughi and Margherita Carosio. The Edinburgh Amina is a living young woman who is rapidly learning to deal with the larger-than-life emotions that come with the libretto. The miracle is that she makes one listen to the words, while at the same time making us look beyond the rather unbelievable and silly plot. To whom should one compare this singer? At best, she invoked a haunting image of the legendary role creator, Giuditta Pasta. Throughout this recording, but especially in the final aria, her singing is full of unexpected shadings, colourings, pianissimi, bravura cadenzas and accents that fill any given part of a word with meaning and truth. When Callas sings, we are looking straight into Amina’s heart. ************ The high quality tapes used as source material for this release come from a private recording made for Callas’s EMI recording producer Walter Legge, and were supplied to Testament by Legge’s widow, the soprano Elisabeth Schwarzkopf. | | | Usually despatched in 4 - 5 working days. |
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| |  | Bellini: La Sonnambula
From a performance from 5.3.1955 in Teatro alla Scala, Milano | | | Usually despatched in 2 - 3 working days. |
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| |  | Bellini: La Sonnambula
Mariella Devia (Amina), Giuseppe Riva (Alessio), Alessandro Verducci (Rodolfo), Luca Canonici (Elvino), Elisabetta Battaglia (Lisa), Laura Musella (Teresa) Piacenza Symphony Orchestra, Coro Citta di Como, Marcello Viotti | | | (also available to download from $21.00) | Usually despatched in 4 - 5 working days. (Available now to download.) |
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Gramophone Magazine
BBC Music Magazine Awards 2008