Maria Callas - Verdi Il trovatore (2023) [Official Digital Download 24/96]

"The role of Leonora is one in which I have much admired Mme Callas. Her assumption is that of a great lady, as it should be; and in the two big arias I have heard her phrase the music like a virtuoso violinist with a mastery which marked her off from most other Leonoras of the common sort. Most of that grandeur is evident in this recording. But to enjoy Mme Callas you have—if I may commit ah Irishism—to like her in the first place. If you can accept that half closed throat and the occasional curdling skirls and the sagging beat on the top notes, all will seem magical. She again brings to the most hackneyed music a gift of recreating it as if it were being sung for the first time. She feels the sense of words (as, for example, neither Tebaldi nor Milanov seem to sense them at all). On the other hand, considered from a purely tonal angle, the purely sensuous side of her singing offers little here to compare to the ravishing sounds which issue from the Leonoras of Tebaldi (in “Tacea la notte”) or Mme Milanov in the introduction to “D’amor sull’ ali”. But the actual spanning and placing of the phrases are lovely and in the rapid and difficult caballetta to the former aria Mme Callas, who is far more nippy with her shakes and gruppetti, though sticking to a fairly safe pace, shows up as a much more practised coloratura singer than either of her rivals. In the scene with the count which comes after the Miserere, Mme Callas is altogether astonishing in her realisation of the drama in her dynamic phrasing, making her rivals sound merely like also rans in a steeple chase. “Mira d’acerbe lagrime” and the vengeful glee of “Vivra! Contend il giubilo” are perfectly in character. Altogether, provided you like Mme Callas’s strange vocal production, you are likely to forget the other two “complete” Leonoras. Only in one place does she a little disappoint me; that is her moment of amazement in the Convent scene, “E deggio — e posso crederlo?”, not nearly as thrilling as expected. But the working up of the ensemble thereafter is exceptionally clear in this new issue. Indeed I do not recall a Trovatore in which so many of the words came through so clearly…

…But what of Herbert von Karajan’s handling of the score as a whole? Well, I find it superior to Erede (Decca), who sounds laggard and cautious by comparison. But the excitements are not always of a very Verdian kind and von Karajan often seems to drive the singers without at the same time achieving that justifiable rightness that we associate with Toscanini’s Verdi. Cellini in the H.M.V. did one or two questionable things, but von Karajan often whips up the tempo in a way which seems to have no warrant in the score or the nature of the music, as if he simply felt that here was a place where the orchestra might as well assert itself. Equally some of the ralientandos sound, not natural, but grudgingly exaggerated, as if a concession to an absurd fashion. There are few untidy passages. Superficially at least it is a “hot” performance and I don’t expect most listeners to share my reserve in this matter of the true Verdian style not being achieved."

TRACKLIST

1. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 1: "All'erta! All'erta!" (Ferrando, Coro)
2. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 1: "Di due figli vivea padre beato" (Ferrando, Coro)
3. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 1: "Abbietta zingara, fosca vegliarda!" (Ferrando, Coro)
4. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 1: "Brevi e tristi giorni visse" (Ferrando, Coro)
5. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 1: "Sull'orlo dei tetti" (Ferrando, Chorus)
6. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 1: "Che più t’arresti?" (Ines, Leonora)
7. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 1: "Tacea la notte placida" (Leonora)
8. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 1: "Quanto narrasti di turbamento m'ha piena I'alma!" (Ines, Leonora)
9. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 1: "Di tale amor" (Leonora)
10. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 1: "Tace la notte!" (Conte)
11. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 1: "Il Trovator! lo fremo!" - "Deserto sulla terra" (Conte, Manrico)
12. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 1: "Anima mia!" - "Più dell’usato" (Conte, Leonora, Manrico)
13. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 1: "Di geloso amor sprezzato" (Conte, Leonora, Manrico)
14. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 2: "Vedi! le fosche notturne spoglie" (Coro)
15. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 2: "Stride la vampa!" (Azucena)
16. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 2: "Mesta è la tua canzon!" (Coro, Azucena, Manrico, Zingaro)
17. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 2: "Soli or siamo" (Manrico, Azucena)
18. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 2: "Condotta ell'era in ceppi" (Azucena, Manrico)
19. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 2: "Non son tuo figlio!" (Manrico, Azucena)
20. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 2: "Mal reggendo all'aspro assalto" (Manrico, Azucena)
21. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 2: "L'usato messo Ruiz invia!" (Manrico, Azucena, Messo)
22. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 2: "Perigliarti ancor languente" (Azucena, Manrico)
23. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 2: "Tutto è deserto" (Conte, Ferrando)
24. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 2: "Il balen del suo sorriso" (Conte)
25. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 2: "Qual suono! Oh ciel!" (Conte, Ferrando, Coro)
26. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 2: "Per me ora fatale" (Conte, Ferrando, Coro)
27. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 2: "Ah! se l'error t'ingombra" (Coro, Conte, Ferrando)
28. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 2: "Perché piangete?" - "O dolci amiche" (Leonora, Ines, Conte, Coro)
29. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 2: "E deggio e posso crederlo?" (Leonora, Conte, Manrico, Ines, Coro, Ferrando, Ruiz)
30. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 3: "Or co' dadi, mi fra poco" (Coro, Ferrando)
31. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 3: "Squilli, echeggi la tromba guerriera" (Coro)
32. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 3: "In braccio al mio rival!" (Conte, Ferrando, Coro, Azucena)
33. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 3: "Giorni poveri vivea" (Conte, Ferrando, Coro, Azucena)
34. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 3: "Deh! rallentate, o barbari" (Conte, Ferrando, Coro, Azucena)
35. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 3: "Quale d'armi fragor" (Leonora, Manrico)
36. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 3: "Ah sì, ben mio, coll'essere io tuo" (Manrico)
37. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 3: "L'onda de' suoni mistici pura discenda al cor! (Leonora, Manrico, Ruiz)
38. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 3: "Di quella pira, l'orrendo foco" (Manrico, Leonora, Ruiz, Coro)
39. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 4: "Siam giunti, ecco la torre" (Ruiz, Leonora)
40. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 4: "D'amor sull'ali rosee" (Leonora)
41. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 4: "Miserere" - "Quel suon, quelle preci" (Coro, Leonora, Manrico)
42. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 4: "Di te, di te scordarmi! Tu vedrai che amore in terra" (Leonora)
43. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 4: "Udiste?" (Conte, Leonora)
44. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 4: "Mira, d'acerbe lagrime" (Leonora, Conte)
45. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 4: "Conte!" - "Né basti!" (Leonora, Conte)
46. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 4: "Colui vivrà" - "Vivrà! Contende il giubilo" (Leonora, Conte)
47. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 4: "Madre, non dormi?" (Manrico, Azucena)
48. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 4: "Non odi? Gente appressa…" (Manrico, Azucena)
49. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 4: "Un giorno turba feroce l'ava tua condusse" (Manrico, Azucena)
50. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 4: "Sì, la stanchezza m’opprime" (Azucena, Manrico)
51. Herbert von Karajan - Il trovatore, Act 4: "Ai nostri monti ritorneremo" (Azucena, Manrico)
52. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 4: "Che! Non m'inganna!" (Manrico, Leonora)
53. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 4: "Parlar non vuoi?" - "Ha quest'infame l'amor venduto" (Manrico, Leonora, Azucena)
54. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 4: "Ti scosta!" (Manrico, Leonora)
55. Maria Callas - Il trovatore, Act 4: "Prima che d'altri vivere" (Leonora, Manrico, Conte, Azucena)



Thanks to the Original customer.