Lucia di Lammermoor (complete opera recorded in 2010)

Editor's Choice Gramophone Magazine - October 2011

"Here's a Valery Gergiev recording in which, for once, the febrile maestro isn't centre stage. This is all about Natalie Dessay's performance as poor deluded Lucy. And if you thrill to the French soprano's hypercharged, histrionic and occasionally wayward delivery of Donizetti's mad scene, you will forgive the ebullient but sometimes rough-edged playing of the Mariinsky Orchestra...Top singing from Vladislav Sulimsky as Enrico."
(Times)

"Here is a Lucia to match Callas or Sutherland. Natalie Dessay's light soprano gives a vivid impression of Lucia's vulnerable personality. The Mad Scene is enthralling. Piotr Beczala is a gloriously virile Edgardo, and the Italian style of the Russian cast more than acceptable. With Valery Gergiev a surprisingly sensitive conductor, this is a top-rank recording of a marvellous opera."
(Daily Telegraph)

"Gergiev drives it hard, admirably sustaining an atmosphere of tremendous neurotic tension throughout...Piotr Beczala's Edgardo is stylish and impulsive, if occasionally effortful."
(Guardian)

"there is something distinctively Russian about this Lammermoor. All those Italian melodies flow beautifully...But there is a sense of drive and purpose about this performance that seems, to me at least, distinctively Slavic...Dessay structures [the Mad Scene] well, always saving something in reserve for the build-ups and outbursts. Some excellent glass harmonica playing from Sascha Reckert...An intense but satisfying experience."
(Classical Review July 2011)