Living at the Opera

Now that the Rossini revival has passed the quarter century mark, it seems fitting for the opera world to take a look at performances before the advent of critical perusal of Rossini’s operas. One such look leads us to his Mosè recorded for RAI in Rome on June 27th, 1956. This is the Italian version of the French work, Moise et Pharaon listed in the notes as a Melodramma sacro in quattro atti.

The committed cast offers some exciting singing at times that could meet today’s vocal scrutiny. Bass, Nicola Rossi-Lemeni’s sound is a little woolly but he makes an imposing biblical leader. Tenor, Agostino Lazzari gives a good account of Elisero but is unschooled in Rossinian technique. The compramari raise the vocal level with soprano,Rosanna Cartieri as Sinaide, bass, Plinio Clabassi as Osiride and Anna Maria Rota as Maria.The two artists that stand out are soprano, Anita Cerquetti  as Anaide and  baritone, Giuseppe Taddei  as Faraone whose impressive vocals compliment Rossini’s multifaceted scoring and would be welcome on today’s stages. Tulio Serafin conducts the Orchestra and Chorus of the RAI with a sure hand, giving Rossini’s music a bit of Verdian energy especially in the closing music expressing the parting of the Red Sea.

1995 Eklipse Records Ltd. EKR P-10

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 19th, 2008 at 2:25 am and is filed under Recommended DVDs & CDs. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.