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Gaetano Donizetti - La Fille du regiment / Dessay, Florez, Palmer, Corbelli, French, Campanella, Pelly (Royal Opera House 2007)
(more) »rank: 2472starring: Natalie Dessay, Juan Diego Florez, Felicity Palmer, Alessandro Corbelli, Dawn French
directed by: Laurent Pelly
: :This DVD version of Donizetti's comic opera zooms right to the top of any list of essential videos for opera fans. It may not be the composer's best work, but given a top-notch production with world class singing actors, it brings vocal thrills and an abundance of laughs, a combination that's hard to beat. The stars are Juan Diego Flórez and Natalie Dessay, both unbeatable in bel canto roles, and both in top form here. Flórez's mellifluous tenor is flexible enough to make child's play of the terrifying (to other tenors) nine high C's in ...
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25 Classical Favorites
(more) »rank: 919from: Vox (Classical)
: :This DVD version of Donizetti's comic opera zooms right to the top of any list of essential videos for opera fans. It may not be the composer's best work, but given a top-notch production with world class singing actors, it brings vocal thrills and an abundance of laughs, a combination that's hard to beat. The stars are Juan Diego Flórez and Natalie Dessay, both unbeatable in bel canto roles, and both in top form here. Flórez's mellifluous tenor is flexible enough to make child's play of the terrifying (to other tenors) nine high C's in ...
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Glass Box: A Nonesuch Retrospective(10 CD)
(more) »rank: 763by: Philip Glass
: :This elegantly packaged 10 disc retrospective surveys four decades of work by Philip Glass, from his earliest solo pieces to his world-renowned operas to his Oscar-nominated film scores. In music, words and pictures, it traces the evolution, as critic Tim Page puts it in his liner notes essay, of 'the first composer to win a wide, multi-generational audience in the opera house, the concert hall, the dance world, in film and in popular music-simultaneously.' The long-awaited release of this set follows this past spring's triumphal new staging of Glass's 1980 Satyagraha at the Metropolitan ...
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Jules Massenet: Manon
(more) »rank: 5805starring: Anna Netrebko, Rolando Villazon, Daniel Barenboim, Alfredo Daza, Christof Fischesser
directed by: Vincent Paterson
:Description:International superstars Anna Netrebko and Rolando Villazón give inspired performances in Massenet's passionate opera, Manon. Netrebko gives full range to her abilities as a singer and actress in portraying innocence, lust, greed and, above all, beauty. It is Netrebko's mesmerizing performance which makes Villazón's youthful passion and ultimate despair even more authentic and heart-breaking. The setting in this production has been updated to the 1950s and the entire opera takes place as if Manon were the star of her own film. Indeed, Netrebko transforms her character from the innocence of Audrey Hepburn through the voluptuousness ...
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Josh Groban
(more) »rank: 854by: Josh Groban
: :No Description AvailableNo Track Information AvailableMedia Type: CDArtist: GROBAN,JOSHTitle: JOSH GROBANStreet Release Date: 11/20/2001DomesticGenre: ROCK/POP :There are worse things in life than making your acting debut on the much ballyhooed season finale of Ally McBeal, though teen operatic baritone Josh Groban doesn't seem destined to encounter them anytime soon. As the awkward high school student-client who asks the typically romance-jinxed Ally to his senior prom, Groban performed this debut album's 'You're Still You' (adapted from film-composing legend Ennio Morricone's Academy Award-nominated score for Malèna, with lyrics by Linda Thompson) as a heart-tugging, literal showstopper. ...
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Pavarotti's Greatest Hits
(more) »rank: 739from: Decca
: :Here's a feast of great tenor singing. It's also a feast of thrills--one selection after another offers Pavarotti's remarkable, full-throated excitement in the music, whether the infectious spirit of his renditions of Neapolitan songs or the trumpet-like High C's he effortlessly tears off in the extended scene from Donizetti's La fille du regiment. Apparent throughout is Pavarotti's big-hearted emotional generosity that infuses this superb collection with an immediacy and communicative power that's impossible to resist. Of course, 'Nessun dorma!' is here to lead off the set with the tenor's biggest hit, but his other Puccini ...
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25 Mozart Favorites
(more) »rank: 879from: Vox (Classical)
: :This is an astonishing collection of works - or parts of works - by Mozart that covers almost every aspect of his creative output: symphonic, religious music, concerti (for piano, horn, violin, clarinet, flute), chamber music, serenades (for strings; winds), a couple of opera overtures and more. Those who know and love Mozart's music will not need this, but it's a great introduction, a great overview. The selections are well-chosen and interestingly organized, with familiar pieces splrinkled among some not-so well known. A good primer. --Robert Levine
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Andrea Bocelli - Amore
(more) »rank: 864by: Andrea Bocelli
: :Romance. Passion. Emotion. These words are synonymous with the voice of Andrea Bocelli. Almost ten years ago he exploded onto the international music scene with Romanza, and has since sold nearly 50 million albums worldwide. Amore--released amongst the glamor of the Winter Olympics in Torino, Italy (where he will perform at the closing ceremony) and the romance of Valentine's Day--finds Bocelli straying from the carefully groomed classical ground in which he is most familiar. The concept of the album came from famed producer and longtime Bocelli fan David Foster along with co-producers Humberto Gatica ...
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Mass
(more) »rank: 5180from: Sony
: :While critics at the 1971 premiere found the work derivative and even tasteless, audiences loved this ardent, resourceful, somewhat brazen, ultimately moving Theatre Piece for Singers, Players, and Dancers. Leonard Bernstein's affinity for his public and for the age in which he lived enabled him to successfully outfit his Mass with a stylish mix of contemporary and ancient modes--rock, jazz, electronic music, Gregorian chant--and place it in a context somewhere between Broadway and opera. Though it lacks the visual component of a live performance, the work holds up well on this Bernstein-led recording, the only ...
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Carreras · Domingo · Pavarotti: The Three Tenors in Concert / Mehta
(more) »rank: 785from: Decca
: :Magic was created one starlit night in July 1990, when Luciano Pavarotti, Placido Domingo and José Carreras met onstage at the Baths of Caracalla in Rome and became the Three Tenors. They eschewed competitive instincts and cooperated in the spirit of mutual admiration to create one of the greatest musical events ever. This concert is an awe-inspiring orgy of the greatest hits for the tenor voice. Domingo and Pavarotti sing perfectly. The audience wins as these vocal supermen compete to seduce the hearts of the audience. One moment Domingo brings thrilling fire and pain to ...
