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Posted By : ArlegZ | Date : 08 Mar 2011 12:29:00 | Comments : 7

Lully Jean-Baptiste – Persee (Hervé Niquet)
NTSC 16:9 (720x480) | MPEG-2 | PCM Stereo; Dolby Digital 5.1; DTS 5.1 | Language: France | Subtitles: D, GB, F | 127 min | 7.03 GB
Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, Hervé Niquet
Recorded live at the Elgin Theatre, 28 April 2004 | Released: 2005 | Label: EuroArts
Posted By : ArlegZ | Date : 08 Mar 2011 02:58:00 | Comments : 11

Cavalli Pier Francesco - La Didone (Fabio Biondi, Claron McFadden, Magnus Staveland)
NTSC 16:9 (720x480) | MPEG-2 | PCM Stereo; Dolby AC3, 6 ch | Language: Italiano | Subtitles: Italiano, English, Français, Deutsch, Espanol | 173 min | 10.8 GB
Europa Galante, Fabio Biondi
Recorded at Teatro La Fenice di Venezia, 2006| Released: 2007 | Label: Dynamic
Posted By : ArlegZ | Date : 08 Mar 2011 02:48:00 | Comments : 7

Bellini - La Sonnambula (Evelino Pidó, Natalie Dessay, Juan Diego Flórez)
NTSC 16:9 (720x480) | MPEG-2 | LinearPCM, 2 ch; DTS, 5.1 | Language: Italiano | Subtitles: English, Francais. Deutsch, Espanol, Chinese | 138 min | 7.31 GB
The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, Chorus and Ballet, Evelino Pidó
Recorded at The Metropolitan Opera in 2009 | Released: 2010 | Label: DECCA
Posted By : ArlegZ | Date : 08 Mar 2011 02:09:00 | Comments : 3

Handel - Agrippina (Jan Willem de Vriend)
DVD 9 | PAL 16:9 (720x576) | MPEG-2 | PCM Stereo; DTS, 6 ch | Language: Italiano | Subtitles: Deutsch, English, Nederlands | 173 min | 7.43 GB
Combattimento Consort Amsterdam, Jan Willem de Vriend
Recorded at the National Slovak Theatre Bratislava in 2004 | Released: 2006 | Label: Challenge
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Posted By : ArlegZ | Date : 08 Mar 2011 01:42:00 | Comments : 15

Cavalli Pier Francesco - La Calisto (René Jacobs, Maria Bayo)
NTSC 4:3 (720x480) | MPEG-2 | PCM Stereo; DTS, 5 ch | Language: Italiano | Subtitles: Italiano, Français, English, Deutsch, Nederlands | 232 min | 13.3 GB
Concerto Vocale, René Jacobs
Recorded: Theatre Royal de la Monnaie, Bruxelles, 20.03.1996 | Released: 2006 | Label: Harmonia Mundi

LA CALISTO has become one of my favorite operas. I like the kaleidoscopic range of voices. Marcello Lippi, in a taxing role, plays both Jove AND Jove impersonating Diana. The role requires him to sing in two totally different ranges. But the whole cast is excellent. Maria Bayo is very good here as la Calisto. A previous reviewer called this opera "camp," but it's too fine to be camp (despite the cross dressing). The classical subject (how the nymph Calisto is seduced by Jove, transformed into a bear by his jealous wife Hera, and eventually becomes the constellation Ursa Major) is very elegantly handled. The production has an intimate-yet-lavish feel, like a royal masque. It's conducted to perfection on period instruments by Rene Jacobs (in very fine form here), and sung to the hilt by the entire cast. And the music itself? As if Orpheus had written it, a cross between Monteverdi and Handel. I'll definitely be looking for more Cavalli in the future. Also included is a one hour "making of" feature, and a few other extras. The 2 disc set is exquisitely packaged by Harmonia Mundi. I give it my highest and most enthusiastic recommendation, particularly if you're a fan of baroque opera. The opera is geared to adults. It has phallic imagery and the sexual theme is sometimes treated explicity (although there's no nudity).
Posted By : ArlegZ | Date : 08 Mar 2011 01:14:00 | Comments : 5

Salieri Antonio – Tarare (Jean-Claude Malgoire)
DVD 9 | NTSC 4:3 (720x420) | MPEG-2 | PCM Stereo | Language: Français | Subtitles: Francais, Deutsch, English, Espanol, Italiano, Japanese | 184 min | 6.91 GB
Deutsche Händel Solisten, Jean-Claude Malgoire
Recorded: From the Schwetzinger Festspiele 1988 | Released: 2005 | Label: Arthaus
Posted By : ArlegZ | Date : 08 Mar 2011 00:28:00 | Comments : 6

Handel – Teseo (Wolfgang Katschner)
NTSC 16:9 (720x480) | MPEG-2 | PCM Stereo; Dolby AC3, 5 ch | Language: Italiano | Subtitles: Italiano, Japanese, English, Francais, Espanol | 166 min | 6.77 GB
Lautten Compagney, Wolfgang Katschner
Recorded live at the Schlosstheater Neues Palais, Postdam in 2004 | Released: 2005 | Label: Arthaus
Posted By : ArlegZ | Date : 07 Mar 2011 21:25:00 | Comments : 6

Pergolesi - Lo frate’ nnamorato (Riccardo Muti)
DVD 9 | NTSC 4:3 (720x480) | MPEG-2 | Dolby AC3, 2 ch | Language: Italiano | Subtitles: English | 172 min | 6.96 GB
Orchestra and Chorus of Teatro alla Scala, Riccardo Muti
Recorded: Teatro alla Scala, 1989 | Released: 2004 | Label: Opus Arte
Posted By : ArlegZ | Date : 07 Mar 2011 19:52:00 | Comments : 5

Salieri Antonio – Falstaff (Arnold Östmann)
PAL 4:3 (720x576) VBR | MPEG-2 | PCM Stereo | Language: Italian | Subtitles: D, GB, F, NL | 120 min | 6.18 GB
Radio Symphony Orchestra Stuttgart, Arnold Östmann
Recorded at the Schwetzinger Festspiele in 1995 | Released: 2000 | Label: Arthaus
Posted By : ArlegZ | Date : 07 Mar 2011 18:52:00 | Comments : 7

Purcell - Dido and Aeneas (William Christie, Malena Ernman)
NTSC 16:9 (720x480) | MPEG-2 | Dolby AC3, 2 ch; DTS, 5 ch | Language: English | Subtitles: Francais, English, Deutsch, Espanol, Italiano | 66 min | 4.72 GB
Les Arts Florissants, William Christie
Recorded at L’Opéra Comique in 2008 | Released: 2010 | Label: FRA Musica
Posted By : ArlegZ | Date : 07 Mar 2011 12:14:57 | Comments : 3

Paisiello - La Serva Padrona (Paolo Vaglieri)
Classical | EAC | Flac(Image)+Cue, Logs, Scans | 311.96 MB
CD:57’47 | January 1, 1998 | Nuova Era Internazionale

The characters move in a musical setting which is perhaps less revolutionary than Pergolesi's had been, the scenic action moves at a slower pace, with longer arias. Pergolesi's means are certainly more limited than Paisiello's, his vocal styles more essential and specific — his Uberto is more desperate and his Serpina craftier, while in Paisiello's opera the characters take on a more worldly and fugy-rounded form. In Paisiello's work Uberto and Serpina sing with greater awareness of the fact that they are actors in an institutionalised theatre, and their arias could at times belong to a different text, as for example the splendid 'Donne Vaghe' with which Serpina opens the second act or the delightful duet 'Donne infeste', whose music sounds more like an act of love than the celebration of deep disagreement. These two episodes, whose pertinence to the development of the plot is quite questionable, do not appear in Pergolesi's text.
Posted By : ArlegZ | Date : 07 Mar 2011 05:57:21 | Comments : 1

Telemann - La Changeante (Simon Standage)
Classical | EAC | Flac(Image)+Cue, Logs, Scans | 311.96 MB
CD:63’20 | July 29, 1991 | Chandos

Recorded in 1990 at Rosslyn Hill Chapel, Hampstead (London), this beautifully produced CD contains six lesser-known works for violin(s) by Germany’s most prolific 18th century composer, Georg Philipp Telemann, who was, during his lifetime, considerably more famous (and more in demand) than any of the Bach dynasty. But as Nicholas Anderson points out in his rather brief introduction to this music, “Telemann did not altogether avoid in his own music those features which he criticised in others; sometimes his harmonies seem sparse, his passagework perfunctory.” Telemann was a great musician, but the violin “seems to have been that in which he was least fluent”. It is also well-known that Telemann’s facility in composing has gained him a reputation for producing quantity rather than quality – a reputation which, on the whole, is undeserved...
Posted By : ArlegZ | Date : 04 Mar 2011 10:49:03 | Comments : 3

Vivaldi - Griselda (Kevin Mallon)
Classical | EAC | Flac(Image)+Cue, Logs, Scans | 726.43 MB
CD1:65’17; CD2:64’21; CD3:39’28 | Jan. 29, 2008 | Naxos

In 1740 Antonio Vivaldi travelled to Vienna in the hope of having at least one of his operas performed during the 1741 Carnival. The death of Charles VI in October 1740, however, and the subsequent closing of the theatres put paid to any such schemes. Vivaldi nevertheless decided to stay on in Vienna. Less than a year later he too was dead. What thoughts must have been racing through the mind of his famous protegee, the mezzo-soprano Anna Gir6, who with her sister Paolina had accompanied il prete rosso on many previous journeys, and who was now, as she walked slowly from the Spitaler Gottesacker where Vivaldi had been given a pauper's burial, bereft of not only her mentor but, as contemporary rumour had it, her lover?
Posted By : ArlegZ | Date : 04 Mar 2011 08:01:41 | Comments : 1

Bach J.S. - Matthaus-Passion (Gustav Leonhardt)
Classical | EAC | Flac(Image)+Cue, Logs, Scans | 713.95 MB
CD1:74’40; CD2:51’10; CD3:46’32 | January 2, 1990 | Harmonia Mundi

"With this work a new world opened up to us", wrote the actor singer Eduard Devrient, recalling the momentous revival of the St. Matthew Passion some forty years earlier in 1829, when he was joined by Mendelssohn, then barely out of his teens yet fully able and willing to shoulder the burden of a stupendous musical challenge. Bach's masterpiece was already one hundred years old but could look back on little more than one or two unsatisfactory performances, scant recognition, and not a note in print.
Posted By : ArlegZ | Date : 27 Feb 2011 16:01:47 | Comments : 5

Handel - Oreste (George Petrou)
Classical | EAC | Flac(Image)+Cue, Logs, Scans | 628.49 MB
CD1:76’39; CD2:68’51 | November 23, 2004 | MD&G Records

Finally, a recording which marries thoughtfully considered knowledge of Baroque style with glorious, golden-toned musical spontaneity. An elegant, tasteful presentation. Mary Ellen Nesi has a gorgeous, naturally full-bodied voice which can be contemplative, then suddenly fly up to effortless and thrilling high notes with perfect intonation. Conductor George Petrou is a perfect match for his orchestra, collaborating to explore the intricacies of Baroque style, finding a fine balance between interpretive extremes. As the narrative of Orestes unfolds, one feels the commitment of these artists to this tale from their homeland of Greece. Continuo accompaniments are fascinating and stylistically appropriate. The string section is clear, pure, yet resonant. I've become jaded about Handel recordings but this one I will play often for friends and family. It also makes for glorious background music! (amazon.com)