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Mozart: Così fan tutte (Highlights)

Teodor Currentzis

Classical - Released October 9, 2015 | Sony Classical

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You may have heard about the radical Mozart performances coming out of the provincial city of Perm, Russia, led by conductor Teodor Currentzis. He's in the middle of a cycle of Mozart's operas with libretti by Lorenzo da Ponte, with a sure-to-be-explosive Don Giovanni yet to come as of late 2015. This single-album set of excerpts from Currentzis' reading of Così fan tutte has sold well out of the blocks, perhaps to listeners curious to hear what the fuss is about, but unwilling to invest in an entire box set. With only snatches of recitative and transition, you miss the outrageous continuo group of fortepiano, lute, cello/gamba, and, yes, hurdy-gurdy. That's a major omission, but all the other aspects of the full opera, and of Currentzis' gleeful disregard for convention, are amply represented. Consider the garish tempo contrasts, with the blistering overture pushed right up to the boundary of playability, while soon after that in Act One the trio "Soave sia il vento" is glacial. That number is one of the many places where it's apparent that soprano Simone Kermes, as Fiordiligi, is perhaps Currentzis' ideal collaborator, able to cope with extravagant musical demands, to deliver fresh characterizations, and generally to enter into the spirit of the thing and make you believe that maybe, just maybe, everybody will be performing Mozart this way in 30 years. In general the characterizations are strong and appealing; Currentzis may be a wild man, but he does not unduly draw attention to himself. And the work of his hand-built Musicaeterna, his historical-instruments group in Perm, is sharp as a tack here: it's an ensemble that can react to all of this conductor's demands. You may get a shock from this, but it's a good kind of shock, and the excerpt album can be generally recommended.© TiVo
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Mozart: En harmonie

Zefiro

Classical - Released March 11, 2014 | Arcana

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Louise Bertin: Fausto

Les Talens Lyriques

Classical - Released January 26, 2024 | Bru Zane

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The classical best-seller charts are unfamiliar environs for the Palazzetto Bru Zane label, which specializes in forgotten 19th century opera. However, this release achieved best-seller status in early 2024, and this is absolutely no surprise, for Louise Bertin's Fausto is a remarkable work. One wonders how long it will take programmers to present it in a cycle with Berlioz's and Gounod's versions of the Faust tale (and perhaps Arrigo Boito's); the work is colorful in the extreme and is sure to be a crowd-pleaser even though it closed after three performances in 1831 and was shelved for the next 190 years. Perhaps the opera mixed so many influences that audiences just did not know what to make of it. Bertin, who was 25 when the work had its premiere in Paris, wrote the libretto herself in Italian. It has all the trappings of Rossinian opera -- fortepiano-accompanied recitative, aria, scena, preghiera, cavatina, big multi-part finales ending with a fast stretta -- but the effect of the music is completely different, and the settings stand up to the weighty aspect of the material. It is as if Weber had written a Faust opera, sometimes even as if Beethoven had written one. The role of Faust is sung by a mezzo-soprano, which is how Bertin wrote it, although a tenor version also exists. This results in intriguing equal-status duets between Karine Deshayes as Fausto and Karina Gauvin as Margarita. Conductor Christophe Rousset catches the ambition and the drama; his ensemble Les Talens Lyriques uses historical instruments but wisely bulks up to an adequate size for the work. Palazzetto Bru Zane, as usual, does the opera justice sonically with a studio recording. This is a remarkable release, not only for lovers of 19th century opera or those interested in music by women, but for anyone.© James Manheim /TiVo
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Mozart : Così fan tutte, K. 588 (Live)

Wolfgang Sawallisch

Opera - Released February 16, 2018 | Orfeo

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Mozart: Così fan tutte

René Jacobs

Classical - Released February 26, 1999 | harmonia mundi

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Mozart Concertante

Aleksandra Kurzak

Opera - Released October 22, 2021 | Aparté

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The Polish soprano Aleksandra Kurzak needs no introduction. After having dazzled the opera stage and the discographic world both in duets and solo, she has devoted the whole of her new recording to Mozart. From The Magic Flute to Zaide, Mitridate and La Clemenza di Tito, the soprano embraces with equal talent the most famous arias of the master of Salzburg… and the verve of her concert presence. Far from limiting herself to just the lyrical attractiveness, she reveals its depth and brilliance by exploring the richness of the dialogue between voice and instruments: the brilliant musicians of the Morphing Chamber Orchestra of Vienna and Aleksandra Kurzak answer to each other, imitate and seek out each other. With them the arias of Mozart become the setting for a theatrical performance that is intimate, droll, and incredibly lively, in which the instruments have their own role to play in the unfolding drama. As an echo to this is added the Sinfonia concertante, for violin, viola and orchestra, one of the composer’s masterpieces in the genre, featuring the international soloists Yuuki Wong and Tomasz Wabnic. © Aparté
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Mozart: Opera Arias

Pavol Breslik

Opera - Released September 9, 2016 | Orfeo

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Mozart: Così fan tutte (Highlights - Sung in German)

Otmar Suitner

Opera - Released January 1, 1970 | Eterna

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Elisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre: Céphale et Procris

Reinoud Van Mechelen

Classical - Released February 9, 2024 | Château de Versailles Spectacles

Hi-Res Booklet Distinctions Diapason d'or
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C. Schumann & C. M. Weber: Piano Concertos

Luisa Imorde

Classical - Released May 19, 2023 | Berlin Classics

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Relatively unknown until a short time ago, the Piano Concerto in A minor, composed by Clara Wieck at the age of fourteen, long before she became Frau Schumann, today enjoys immense popularity. The number of recordings multiplied, while her other works dragged on behind. Her career as a composer was shattered by the macho attitudes of the time, which inevitably considered that women belonged in the kitchen or raising children. While living with an extremely depressed husband, she fell pregnant eleven times in just thirteen years. Consequently, Clara Schumann had very little time left to compose...Coming from a family of musicians, the young German pianist, Luisa Imorde, approaches Clara Schumann's Concerto opus 7 from an almost Beethovenian perspective, skipping the pure virtuosity of the writing to better extract gravity, subtle transitions, and permanent reinventions. Her programme is completed by five Lieder (by Robert), written for solo piano by his wife, and four pieces by Carl Maria von Weber, a composer whom the latter played throughout her long career as a pianist after Schumann's death.It is from this historical perspective that this album ends with Weber's Concerto No. 1 in C Major. Luisa Imorde performs it with the Bremen Philharmonic under the direction of the French conductor, Marie Jacquot, who was Kirill Petrenko's assistant before being appointed Music Director of the Royal Danish Orchestra from 2024 and Principal Guest Conductor of the Vienna Symphony Orchestra. © François Hudry/Qobuz
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Beethoven: Symphonies Nos. 9,7,5,3 by Ferenc Fricsay

Ferenc Fricsay

Classical - Released March 4, 2022 | Alexandre Bak - Classical Music Reference Recording

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Mozart: Don Giovanni by Wilhelm Furtwängler

Wilhelm Furtwängler

Opera - Released January 8, 2022 | Alexandre Bak - Classical Music Reference Recording

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Mozart

Juan Diego Flórez

Opera Extracts - Released October 6, 2017 | Sony Classical

Hi-Res Booklet Distinctions 5 de Diapason - Choc de Classica
Juan Diego Flórez is undeniably among the most charismatic of the early 21st century crop of opera stars, and it's understandable that Sony wanted to snap up the charismatic Peruvian tenor for recital discs. Moreover, Mozart is a perennial program for such events. Flórez, however, admits up front that he hasn't had much experience with Mozart, and this is a rather offbeat release that depicts Mozart in a heroic mode. Flórez, to his credit, understands that this is where the strength of his voice lies, and he populates the album mostly with big songs of kings and emperors. These pieces from Idomeneo, La clemenza di Tito, and Il re pastore aren't heard so much, and you could sample the way the music starts with a bang in "Fuor del mar" from Idomeneo to hear the tenor in his comfort zone. The news is less good as he bulls through "Dies Bildnis ist bezaubernd schön," from Die Zauberflöte, and a certain aural fatigue sets in after a period of time listening to the limited range of vocal timbres on offer. Then again, he gets sensitive support from the Orchestra La Scintilla under Riccardo Minasi, and the final concert aria, Misero! O sogno, K. 431, both fits into Flórez's wheelhouse and isn't a terribly common item. The bottom line is that for Flórez fans this will be a satisfying outing, but those looking for a basic collection of Mozart arias might try elsewhere.© TiVo
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Haydn: String Quartets, Op. 76

Quatuor Mosaïques

Chamber Music - Released April 25, 2000 | naïve

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Bruch: Symphonies Nos. 1-3 & Overtures

Bamberger Symphoniker

Classical - Released July 3, 2020 | CPO

Booklet Distinctions Diapason d'or
These three symphonies by Max Bruch were revisited in a beautiful recording by Kurt Masur in Leipzig in the late 1980s, as well as at the beginning of the following decade in a recording by James Colon and the Gürzenich Orchestra from Cologne. As the Germanic music repertoire was so rich in this particular period with the likes of Mendelssohn, Schumann, Brahms, and later Bruckner and Mahler, many composers of merit such as Max Bruch were often overlooked. Bruch resisted the musical evolution of the time and remained a conservative composer. He rejected the modernity of the works of Liszt, Wagner, Bruckner and Mahler, with whom he had rubbed shoulders in the course of his eighty-two-year existence. He was a close friend of Brahms and shrewdly predicted his future success, but his own success only really stemmed from the reputation of his Violin Concerto in G minor. Although not quite as great a genius as some of his great contemporaries, Bruch’s three symphonies should nevertheless be commended for many reasons, beginning with their romantic melancholy and skilful and powerful orchestration. Also noteworthy is the gradual complexification of the structure from Symphony No. 2 and the stylistic boldness that peaks in Symphony No. 3 which resumes the traditional four-movement structure and leads to a very joyful finale. Robert Trevino, a young American conductor, worked on this repertoire alongside his complete Beethoven symphonies with the Malmö Symphony Orchestra for Ondine. Here, he directs the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra, an orchestra that is well-known to music lovers all around the world. © François Hudry/Qobuz
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Haydn - Bartók - Mozart

Quatuor Modigliani

Classical - Released February 5, 2021 | Mirare

Hi-Res Booklet Distinctions Diapason d'or
Revered since the height of the Classical era up to the simmering years of the 20th century, the string quartet represented an ideal genre to which composers entrusted their most innovative ideas. The Modigliani Quartet illuminates these brillant masterpieces, each bearing witness to a turning point in the lives of their authors. Brimming with poetry, audacity and a thirst for life, the singular narratives of these quartets herald the advent of new horizons. © Mirare
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Mozart: Don Giovanni

Freiburger Barockorchester

Opera - Released January 1, 2007 | harmonia mundi

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Mozart: Piano Concertos II

Keith Jarrett

Classical - Released January 1, 1996 | ECM New Series

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Mendelssohn

Fabio Biondi

Classical - Released September 23, 2022 | naïve

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Itzhak Perlman Plays Mozart & Beethoven

Itzhak Perlman

Classical - Released April 4, 2024 | Warner Classics