GILBERT and SULLIVAN
MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Gilbert & Sullivan: Princess Ida Ambrosian Opera Chorus with Frank Gorshin, Nan Christie, Laurence Dale, Anne Collins & others [ BBC / Umbrella DVD / DVD - released 10/Aug/2014 ] Music by the London Symphony Orchestra, the Ambrosian Opera Chorus and a host of stars including Frank Gorshin, Bernard Dickerson, Anne Collins and Claire Powell. 114 minutes. For more than 100 years the operas of Gilbert & Sullivan have played to... |
GILBERT and SULLIVAN
MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Gilbert & Sullivan: Patience & The Sorcerer [2 DVDs] Ambrosian Opera Chorus with Sandra Dugdale, Donald Adams, Derek Hammond-Stroud, John Fryatt, Clive Revill, David Kernan & Nana Christie [ BBC / Umbrella DVD / DVD - released 10/Aug/2014 ] For more than 100 years the operas of Gilbert & Sullivan have played to packed audiences around the world. These two names have become synonymous with classic light opera - music that is timeless and tuneful lyrics that are witty, scathing and memorable. |
LUDWIG van BEETHOVEN
Beethoven: Symphonies Nos. 1, 6 & 8 (recorded 2001) Berliner Philharmoniker [Berlin Philharmonic], Claudio Abbado [ EuroArts DVD / DVD - released 1/Mar/2014 ] Recorded live at the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, Rome, February 2001 |
WAGNER / BERNSTEIN / MOZART / VERDI / TRADITIONAL / etc
Bryn Terfel - Live in Concert - Songs and Arias Bryn Terfel (baritone) / Radio Filharmonisch Orkest Holland, Edo de Waart [ Deutsche Grammophon DVD / DVD - released 1/Jun/2002 ] "An undemanding popular concert with something for everybody - splendidly performed and brilliantly recorded. Recommended." MusicWeb |
W. A. MOZART
MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Mozart: Le Nozze di Figaro [The Marriage of Figaro] (complete opera directed by Jean-Pierre Ponnelle. Recorded in 1976) Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau / Dame Kiri Te Kanawa, Mirella Freni, Hermann Prey, Maria Ewing / Vienna Philharmonic / Karl Bohm [ Deutsche Grammophon DVD / 2 DVD - released 2/Jun/2005 ] "a visual treat, but having some solos delivered as interior monologues is distracting" Gramophone |
W. A. MOZART
MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Mozart: Le Nozze Di Figaro [The Marriage Of Figaro] (Complete Opera recorded in 1994) Glyndebourne Opera / Gerald Finley, Alison Hagley, Renee Fleming / Bernard Haitink (conductor) [ Warner Music Vision DVD / DVD - released 10/Sep/2009 ] "Pure magic….Bernard Haitink conducted the LPO in an eloquent performance, beautifully played…….One listened, as Haitink, Hagley, and Finley lifted a loving, carefully prepared performance to greatness" Opera Magazine |
VINCENZO BELLINI
Bellini: La Sonnambula (the complete opera, recorded in 2009) Metropolitan Opera / Juan Diego Florez, Natalie Dessay, Michele Pertusi / Evelino Pido (conductor) [ Decca Music Group DVD / DVD - released 11/Mar/2010 ] G:- "[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... |
GIUSEPPE VERDI
Verdi: Rigoletto (Complete opera recorded in 1977) The Metropolitan Opera / Placido Domingo, Ileana Cotrubas, Cornell MacNeil / James Levine (cond) [ Deutsche Grammophon DVD / DVD - released 27/May/2004 ] "Yes, Rigoletto is a singer's opera, but Verdi also poured into it some of his most dramatic as well as melodic music. That said, the vivid colours of the production have come up amazingly well and the sound is clear." (MusicWeb Dec 2006) |
JULES MASSENET
MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Massenet: Thais (complete opera, recorded in 2009) Metropolitan Opera / Renee Fleming, Thomas Hampson, Michael Schade / Jesus Lopez-Cobos (cond) [ Decca Music Group DVD / DVD - released 18/Feb/2010 ] The New York Times lauded Renée Fleming as a "vocally sumptuous and unabashedly show-stealing Thaïs". If this is crime, opera needs more of it! |
FRANZ LEHAR
Lehar: The Merry Widow (complete operetta recorded in 1988) Opera Australia / Joan Sutherland, Ron Stevens, Ann-Maree McDonald / Richard Bonynge (cond) [ ABC Universal DVD / DVD - released 1/Mar/2011 ] The sparkling story concerns a national crisis in the picture-postcard country of Pontevedro, as the recently-widowed Hanna Glawari appears to be in danger of marrying a foreigner. |
TAN DUN
MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Tan Dun - Tea, A Mirror of Soul (complete opera recorded in 2002) Tokyo Opera / Haijing Fu, Nancy Allen Lundy, Christopher Gillett, Ning Liang / Tan Dun (cond) [ Deutsche Grammophon DVD / DVD - released 2/Feb/2005 ] "Tea's real accomplishment, however, comes in the music...the vocal writing is in another league entirely, relying on neither Peking Opera references nor extended Western techniques but instead harking back to almost bel canto-like lyricism" Gramopho |
CHARLES GOUNOD
MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Gounod: Faust (complete opera directed by Ken Russell in 1985) Vienna State Opera / Gabriela Benackova, Francisco Araiza, Ruggero Raimondi / Erich Binder (cond) [ Deutsche Grammophon DVD / 2 DVD - released 23/Jun/2006 ] Gounod's crowning achievement Faust, first staged in 1859 at the Lyric Theatre in Paris, is a conflict of good and evil, love and hate. |
GILBERT and SULLIVAN
MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Gilbert & Sullivan: The Yeomen of the Guard Ambrosian Opera Chorus with Joel Grey, elizabeth Gale, Claire Powell, Alfred Marks, David Hillman & Elizabeth Bainbridge & others [ BBC / Umbrella DVD / DVD - released 10/Aug/2014 ] For more than 100 years the operas of Gilbert & Sullivan have played to packed audiences around the world. These two names have become synonymous with classic light opera - music that is timeless and tuneful lyrics that are witty, scathing and memorable. |
GILBERT and SULLIVAN
MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Gilbert & Sullivan: Ruddigore Ambrosian Opera Chorus with Vincent Price, Keith Michell, John Treleaven, Ann Howard, Sandra Dugdale, Donald Adams & Johanna Peters [ BBC / Umbrella DVD / DVD - released 10/Aug/2014 ] For more than 100 years the operas of Gilbert & Sullivan have played to packed audiences around the world. These two names have become synonymous with classic light opera - music that is timeless and tuneful lyrics that are witty, scathing and memorable. |
HECTOR BERLIOZ
MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Berlioz: La Damnation de Faust (The Damnation of Faust) - From the Royal Albert Hall 1989 Anne Sofie Von Otter, Keith Lewis, Jose Van Dam, Peter Rose / The Chicago Symphony Chorus and Orchestra, Sir Georg Solti [ AWD DVD / DVD - released 20/Jan/2006 ] Sir Georg Solti conducts the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Chorus in a magnificent performance of Berlioz's concert cantata. |
GILBERT and SULLIVAN
MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Gilbert & Sullivan: The Mikado (complete operetta recorded in 1987) Opera Australia / Anne-Maree McDonald, Peter Cousens, Heather Begg, Graeme Ewer, Gregory Yurisich / Andrew Green (conductor) [ ABC Universal DVD / DVD - released 1/Mar/2011 ] "Wit, ingenuity, and a veritable riot of colourful and restless spectacle continue to make The Australian Opera production of The Mikado an experience designed to seduce the eye, charm the ear and tickle the rib." -THE SYDNEY MORNING HERALD |
GIOACHINO ROSSINI
MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Rossini: La Cenerentola [Cinderella] (complete opera with full libretto recorded in 1992) Cecilia Bartoli, William Matteuzzi, Enzo Dara, Alessandro Corbelli / Orchestra & Chorus of the Teatro Comunale di Bologna, Riccardo Chailly [ Decca DVD / DVD - released 28/Aug/2014 ] "All eyes and ears, inevitably, are on Bartoli, and she doesn't disappoint...The singing itself is ravishing. At the same time, the performance makes dramatic sense...Decca provide a superb Alidoro, an alluring Clorinda, inventive and elaborate... |
W. A. MOZART / FRANZ SCHUBERT
MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Mozart: Symphonies 31, 39, 40, 41 / Schubert: Symphony No. 4 Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Vienna Philharmonic, Nikolaus Harnoncourt [ Deutsche Grammophon DVD / DVD - released 1/Oct/2016 ] Schubert's 'Tragic' Symphony and Mozart's 'Paris' Symphony are performed by the Vienna Philharmonic under the baton of Nikolaus Harnoncourt at the Wiener Musikvereinsaal in 1984. Harnoncourt goes back to Schubert's original manuscripts. |
W. A. MOZART
MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: The Essential Mozart [5 DVD set] Gil Shaham / Sharon Kam / Sandrine Piau / Dorothea Roschmann / Daniel Barenboim / and more [ EuroArts DVD / 5 DVD Box Set - released 10/Oct/2011 ] MediciArts offers a DVD box full of the most sparkling of Mozart's compositions. Performed by instrumentalists, orchestras, conductors and singers, among the best interpreters of his works, this representative selection... |
GEORGES BIZET
MARBECKS COLLECTABLE: Bizet: Carmen (complete opera recorded in 1985) Grace Bumbry, Jon Vickers, Mirella Freni, Justino Diaz / Vienna State Opera Choir & Vienna Philharmonic, Herbert von Karajan [ Deusche Grammophon DVD / DVD - released 1/Dec/2005 ] This famous film of the world's best-loved opera, directed by Herbert von karajan, features the three greatest exponents of their respective roles at the time. - "overwhelming in its truthfulness to the tragic vision of Carmen", wrote the... |