Classical > Bellini, Vincenzo Classical > London Symphony Orchestra

Does exactly what it says on the tin!

Advantages: easy to find the piece of music you want
Disadvantages: maybe too familiar for the expert listener

...I have begun to explore the world of opera, deciding to inject a little culture in my life! My uncle had definitely been listening to my interests as this CD was one of the great gifts I had. It is a double disc album, cleverly titled 'The Only Opera Album You'll Ever Need! And I can honestly say that this may be a very true claim! Only the most famous arias are included on these cds, covering many composers including Mozart, Wagner, Verdi, Puccini, ...
...with the place you'll recognise the song from, such as the British Airways advert, the films Fatal Attraction and Moonstruck and the Baileys tv advert. This is extremely helpful for those times when you just can't place where you know a song from. In my house this has also settled many arguments about which composers feature on which advert! The songs are beautifully performed by Luciano Pavarotti, Lesley Garrett, Placido Domingo and many other ...

fluffyfreak 08.01.2004 · Read full review
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Review of The Only Opera Album You'll Ever Need, Volume 2

Terrific Selection

Advantages: Golden-age singers in great sound and a good variety of performances
Disadvantages: None

I listen to this CD an awful lot and I am very happy with it. The mixture of French and Italian opera here is excellent. Some of the very best opera singers DECCA have ever had are here, Sutherland, Pavarotti (a lot of Pavarotti), Carreras (rather strained but potent beside Kiri te Kanawa in 1987), Caballe, Freni, Bergonzi all star. Particularly impressive is the duet with Mario del Monaco and Ettore Bastianini from La Forza del Destino which is ...
...but in terrific stereo sound (it is amazing that the recording, the oldest selection on this cd, is from over 50 years ago you simply couldnt tell from the sound. The quality of the stereo is good amongst all the extracts, even the only live performance, Pavarotti and Kiri Te Kanawa in Otello from 1991 with Georg Solti, is free from much background noise. A lot of good singing is brought together here and this proves a invaluable resource for finding ...

operalover2000 01.01.2009 · Read full review
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Review of Great Opera Duets

Pavarotti at his very best

Advantages: Young/Prime Pavarotti in core repertoire in brilliant stereo sound
Disadvantages: Very little

...(not a big figure in Pavarotti's career but beautifully sung) and Puccini with Nessun Dorma taking pride of place. The inclusion of Italian songs is good fun and very well sung, listen to the high notes in the mattinata, but there are not any of pavarotti's collaborations with celebrities like Sinatra etc which for me is a major plus but to others may be a bit of a let down depending how much you enjoy his 'pop' music output. His major early success ...
...regiment and Rodolfo in La Boheme the role he debuted in in very early 1960s. The roles are lyrical (Nemorino in Elisir d'amore) , middle weight (Boheme, Tosca) and quite heavy roles (Radames in Aida) so there is a good variety of work, probably the lyrical is more succesful but that is really just my preference (probably relates to the fact I like bel canto music which he sang so well in the 60s and 70s - A te o cara by the way is probably the finest ...

operalover2000 01.01.2009 · Read full review
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Review of Pavarotti's Greatest Hits

Sumptuous works by a little-known composer

Advantages: Good recordings of unfamiliar, but rewarding works
Disadvantages: None

Karlowicz is a relatively unknown composer whose chief claim to fame was his untimely death in a skiing accident just before the First World War. He left a small collection of works, the later of which (figured in this disc) show a talent that was tragically snuffed out before he could achieve greatness. The Symphonic Poems featured here reveal a composer adept at interesting orchestral effects (try the sad theme at the start of the Lithuanian Rhapsody, ...
...writing for the lower-toned instruments of the orchestra. Karlowicz has clearly learnt a lot from Richard Strauss, whose shadow fell across much pre-1914 music, but it often lacks the extrovert quality of the Gernman composer's tone poems; as the inlay notes say, there is a 'brooding' quality to much of this music, particularly evident in the middle sections of these works. Another feature of Karlowicz's writing is his tendency to pick himself up ...

chivhu 15.09.2009 · Read full review
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Review of Karlowicz: Symphonic Poems Vol 1

Music for Meditation

Advantages: A good introduction to sacred music
Disadvantages: A rather niche album on which those into the genre will find nothing new

...the same. Requiem is subtitled "music for Reflection and Meditation". It takes various well known settings of the requiem mass, together with a couple of other fitting pieces and puts them together in one place. If one is so minded, one should note that this album is NOT a requiem mass. The pieces don't follow in the right order but, having said that, to the knowledgeable, the whole album stands on its own as a good religious set. One of the other ...
...who are less well-known. When one says "requiem" one might think of Verdi or Mozart but here we also have offerings from Spanish composer Lobo (a motet) and the Italian Pergolesi (an extract from his Sabat Mater). I feel that Naxos have really got it right with this compilation. The perfect balance between the known and the unknown is struck with excerpts from the more well known Requiems by Mozart and Verdi featuring more than once meaning ...

CareBear 15.09.2009 · Read full review
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Review of Requiem - Classical Music for Reflection & Meditation