Donizetti reviews

Donizetti: Lucrezia Borgia (DVD)

Carmela Remigio, Marko Mimica et al; Orchestra Giovanile Luigi Cherubini/Riccardo Frizza (Dynamic / DVD)
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Donizetti: Pietro il grande

Roberto De Candia, Marco Filippo Romano, et al; Gli Originali/Rinaldo Alessandrini (Dynamic / DVD)
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Donizetti: Il paria

Albina Shagimuratova, et al; Opera Rara Chorus; Britten Sinfonia/Mark Elder (Opera Rara)
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Italian Opera Arias (Linda Richardson)

Linda Richardson (soprano); Sinfonia of London/John Wilson (Chandos)
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Donizetti: L'Ange de Nisida

Florian Sempey, Roberto Lorenzi, et al; Donizetti Opera Orchestra & Chorus/Jean-Luc Tingaud (Dynamic / DVD)
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Tudor Queens (Donizetti)

Diana Damrau (soprano), et al; Santa Cecilia Choir & Orchestra/Antonio Pappano (Erato)
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Donizetti: Il Borgomastro di Saardam

Giorgio Caoduro, Juan Francisco Gatell, Andrea Concetti; Donizetti Opera Chorus & Orchestra/Roberto Rizzi Brignoli; dir. Davide Ferrario (
Dynamic; DVD & CD)
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Donizetti: Enrico di Borgogna

Anna Bonitatibus, Francesco Castoro et al, Donizetti Opera Choir; Academia Montis Regalis/Alessandro De Marchi; Dir. Silvia Paoli (Bergamo, 2018) (Dynamic DVD)
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French Arias

Petr Nekoranec (tenor); Zuzana Markova (soprano); Czech Philharmonic/Christopher Franklin (Supraphon)
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Momento Immobile: Arias by Bellini, Donizetti and Rossini

Venera Gimadieva, Natalia Brzezińska, Alberto Sousa; The Hallé/Gianluca Marcianò (Rubicon)
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Spirito: Arias by Bellini, Donizetti and Spontini

Marina Rebeka; Teatro Massimo Palermo Chorus & Orchestra/Jader Bignamini (Prima Classic)
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Donizetti: Pigmalione; Mayr: Che originali!

Bruno de Simone, Chiara Amarù, Leonardo Cortellazzi, Antonino Siragusa, Aya Wakizono; Orchestra dell’Accademia Teatro alla Scala/Gianluca Capuano; dir. Roberto Catalano (Dynamic; DVD)
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Duets by Bizet, Boito, Donizetti, Verdi, Gounod, Lara and F. Hermann

This is boys having fun. And the CD is at its best when the composer is having fun too. So Rolando Villazón and Ildar Abdrazakov make the most of Donizetti’s Act I duet from L’eslisir d’amore, with Villazón a plaintive love-sick Nemorino and Abdrazakov a snake-like Dulcamara.

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Decades – A Century of Song, Vol. 4

Anush Hovhannisyan (soprano), et al, Malcolm Martineau (piano) (VIVAT)
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Benjamin Bernheim

Benjamin Bernheim (tenor); PFK Prague Philharmonia/Emmanuel Villaume (DG)
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Pretty Yende: Dreams

This new disc from the South African soprano covers similar territory to her previous, prize-winning debut disc. She begins with a nigh-on immaculate account of the waltz song from Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette. To the Mad Scene from Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor (her previous disc included different extracts) she brings a pure and ethereal tone, entering into the character and her poignant situation within a world of her own beyond earthly reality.

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Katie Mitchell directs Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor

Katie Mitchell’s ‘split-screen’ production of Lucia di Lammermoor opened to mixed reviews in 2016: some focusing on the drip of the plumbing in Vicki Mortimer’s scrupulous reconstruction of a Victorian bathroom; some on over-crowding issues in the grand set pieces for chorus and principals; some on the intrusive manifestations of the ghosts of the Lammermuir girl and Lucia’s mother. The staging is over-stuffed but it is not stupid or careless.

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New life breathed into Donizetti's lost opera

‘Mark Elder is a conductor who really understands how to let Donizetti breathe’ 
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Overtures, Preludes & Intermezzi by Bellini, Boito, Catalani, Donizetti, Giordano, Leoncavallo, Ponchielli, Puccini, Rossini & Verdi

Riccardo Chailly’s collection with the orchestra of La Scala, where the Italian conductor is now music director, consists of orchestral extracts from Italian operas.

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Members of the Bavarian State Opera Chorus perform works by Donizetti & Mayr

Giovanni Simone Mayr was the first of Donizetti’s teachers, and they remained lifelong friends. As well as opera, Mayr specialised in church music, while much of Donizetti’s sacred output dates either from his years of study or the beginning of his career before he really got going on the operatic circuit. There’s only one complete authentic Mass setting by Donizetti – in C minor (1837) – and even this was assembled by him from earlier pieces.

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Il Campanello by Donizetti gorgeously performed by Agnes Baltsa and Enzo Dara

One of Donizetti’s most charming short operas, with a Don Pasquale-like plot, and gorgeously performed by Agnes Baltsa and Enzo Dara, this is a nice way of spending a spare 55 minutes.

Michael Tanner

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Zurab Anjaparidze performs Arias and Scenes by Puccini, Verdi, Leoncavallo, Donizetti, Tchaikovsky

Tonally and technically magnificent singing (with the odd hairy-chested moment) from this Georgian tenor, whose Hermann in Queen of Spades is probably unsurpassed. Beautifully sensitive conducting by Ermler.

Malcolm Hayes

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Pretty Yende: A Journey - Arias by Rossini, Delibes, Bellini, Gounod & Donizetti

This is the most exciting debut album to come my way for a long time. Pretty Yende, a South African who has already made a big impression in Europe and at the New York Met, sings a selection of mainly bel canto scenes. And they are scenes, not just arias, with supporting singers and chorus, which makes all the difference. Her voice is full, already has many colours and her coloratura is effortless but also expressive – nothing she does is merely for show. 

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Casanova and Vargas feature in a performance of Donizetti's La favorite

One of the finest of Donizetti’s serious operas, sung here in the original French, La favorite impresses in this recording under Marcello Viotti, though Vesselina Kasarova’s Léonor sounds thin.

George Hall 

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