Verdi: Il Trovatore

“Verrett's portrayal, always one of her best roles, is given here with more feeling and involvement than anyone else in the cast...Vocally speaking, the two veteran singers are well attuned to each other, attempting the familiar with nicely varied accents and dynamics...[Pavarotti] sings [Manrico] with such unfailing musicality and sense of line (listen to the recitative before "Ali si, ben mio", indeed the aria itself) that the missing decibels are hardly missed” Gramophone Magazine, July 1995

“Both [Corelli and Price] are in their element and close to ideal in their respective roles, even if Corelli's penchant for hanging onto high notes is on the excessive side...Cleva is hardly an exciting conductor, but he's supportive and undoubtedly knows where the score should go.” BBC Music Magazine, December 2011 ****

“Price is clearly the star, singing the role just about perfectly...Corelli runs a close second...It's all here - the tempered-steel top, the low larynx placement that makes the lower notes so excitingly dark by contrast, the diminuendi for effect...and so are the bad habits...Dalis's Azucena is vivid and exciting without owning the true Italianate, insane oomph the part requires.” International Record Review, January 2012

“Tacea la notte is [Price's] calling card, it calls for golden tone, fine spun legato and nuances. It gets all this, one sits breathless, although one has heard her in the aria before, in even earlier recordings. It is something special with this live experience and there’s a sense that 51 years and many hundred miles away another 4000 listeners are also holding their breath...it is a thrilling document of a Met performance reeking with passion.” MusicWeb International, August 2012

“Leonora was one of Callas’s finest stage roles and this recording is wonderfully intense, with a dark concentrated loveliness of sound in the principal arias. Karajan conducts with that almost insolent mastery of score and orchestra which made him such a phenomenon at this period of his career. Whatever you do, don’t miss this set” Gramophone Magazine

“Callas is on commanding form as Leonora, Di Stefano is at his best and the whole performance is knit together with superb dramatic flair by Karajan. This is one of the most memorable and enduring recordings ever made of Il Trovatore.” International Record Review, January 2011

“The combination of Karajan and Callas is formidably impressive. There is toughness and dramatic determination in Callas's singing...Barbieri is a magnificent Azucena, Panerai is a strong, incisive Count, and di Stefano is at his finest as Manrico...The Regis transfer is clean and clear” Penguin Guide, 2010 edition ***

“blessed with Serafin’s lithe, clear, unforced conducting…and a cast all of whose members are Italian” Gramophone Magazine

“Serafin's splendidly red-blooded La Scala version on DG Double is most enjoyable, with the contributions of Cossotto as Azucena and Carlo Bergonzi, splendid as Manrico, matching almost any rival...The conducting of Serafin is crisp and stylish, and the 1963 recording is vividly transferred to CD with plenty of atmosphere.” Penguin Guide, 2010 edition ***

“Callas and Karajan took the world by the ears in the 1950s with this Il trovatore. Leonora was one of Callas's finest stage roles, and this recording is wonderfully intense, with a dark concentrated loveliness of sound in the principal arias that puts one in mind of Muzio or Ponselle at their best. Walter Legge always managed to team Callas with the right conductor for the work in question. Often it was Serafin, but Karajan in Il trovatore is utterly compelling.
This opera, like Beethoven's Seventh Symphony and Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring, is one of music's great essays in sustained rhythmic intensity; dramatically it deals powerfully in human archetypes. All this is realised by the young Karajan with that almost insolent mastery of score and orchestra which made him such a phenomenon at this period of is career. There are some cuts, but, equally, some welcome inclusions (such as the second verse of 'Di quella pira', sung by di Stefano with his own unique kind of slancio).
Although the EMI sound is very good, one or two climaxes suggest that in the heat of the moment, the engineer, Robert Beckett, let the needle run into the red and you might care to play the set in mono to restore that peculiar clarity and homogeneity of sound which are the mark of Legge's finest productions of the mono era. But whatever you do don't miss this set.” Gramophone Classical Music Guide, 2010

“As a whole, the interpretation encompasses everything from the dark, conspiratorial air of the start (Nesterenko quite excellent) through the ardent statements of love from three of the principals ("Ah, sì, ben mio" beautifully shaped) to the rollicking extroversion of gipsies and soldiers [...] I would unhesitatingly recommend this version to even the most jaded Verdian” Gramophone Magazine, 1984