A performance of the Verdi REQUIEM from the Arena di Verona, 1980. Riccardo Muti conducts.
Watch and listen here.
It’s a rather murky video, but the singing is superb. The soloists are Montserrat Caballé, Brigitte Fassbaender, Veriano Luchetti, and Ruggero Raimondi.
Above: Iréne Theorin as Elektra, borne aloft by the maids
I came upon this video of Robert Carsen’s 2013 production of Strauss’s ELEKTRA for the Bastille, Paris, by chance. Despite an odd acoustic (which you’ll get used to) and the annoying watermark that cuts across the screen, it’s incredibly powerful both musically and visually.
Here is a link to watch it on YouTube. I wish it would be released on DVD.
~ Oberon
Cheryl Studer and Luciana D’Intino sing the confrontation duet from Act II of Verdi’s AIDA from a 1994 performance at London’s Covent Garden.
Watch and listen here.
Cheryl Studer and Luciana D’Intino sing the confrontation duet from Act II of Verdi’s AIDA from a 1994 performance at London’s Covent Garden.
Watch and listen here.
The Verdi REQUIEM, as recorded by the Warsaw National Philharmonic.
Kazimierz Kord conducts an all-Polish quartet of soloists: Teresa Żylis-Gara, Krystyna Szostek-Radkowa, Wiesław Ochman,and Leonard Andrzej Mróz.
Listen here.
As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, I found this performance of the Verdi masterwork by happy chance while looking for recordings by basso Leonard Andrzej Mróz (above). It instantly became one of my favorite recordings of the REQUIEM.
Mr. Mróz, as it turns out, passed away recently – in December 2020 at the age of 73. He was a native of Warsaw who began his career by winning voice competitions at Wroclaw, Munich, Geneva, and Amsterdam. He joined the Grand Theatre, Warsaw, in 1972 and sang there for many seasons.
The basso’s international career took him to Glyndebourne, New York’s Carnegie Hall, Vienna, Budapest, Prague, Moscow, Paris, Parma, Mexico, Sofia, Philadelphia, London, Lisbon, Cleveland, Leipzing, Dresden, Paris, Berlin, and Moscow, as well as opera centers in Great Britain, Switzerland, Austria, the Netherlands, and Italy.
After retiring from the stage, Mr. Mróz taught at the State Music School Fryderyk Chopin in Warsaw and at the Academy of Music in Poznan.
Leonard Andrzej Mróz sings Rachmaninov’s Zdes’ khorosho here, the Death Scene from BORIS GODUNOV here, and Banquo’s aria (and murder) from Verdi’s MACBETH here.
Renata Tebaldi (above), Gianni Poggi, and Giangiacomo Guelfi star in a televised performance of TOSCA from Tokyo 1961. Arturo Basile conducts.
Watch and listen here.
Handel’s Sarabande in D-minor performed by Rodion Zamuruev (violin) and the Mobilis Ensemble; recorded at the Rachmaninov Hall of the Moscow Conservatory in May 2015.
Watch and listen here.
Oberon's Glade 