Cavalleria Rusticana

Jussi Björling was one of the strongest and steeliest lyric tenors of the 20th century, as famous for his Rodolfo in La Boheme as he was for his Calaf in Turandot. This superbly engineered survey of his early career takes us from 1936 to 1948, and covers, for the most part, his standard repertoire of French and Italian music–extracts from Aida and from Faust, and from both Massenet's Manon and Puccini's Manon Lescaut. He was a singer equally at home with the elegances of bel canto and with the passionate sorrows of verismo–he is particularly fine in "Vesti la guibbia" from Leoncavallo's Pagliacci… –Roz Kaveney

Victoria de los Angeles was one of the finest lyric sopranos in the decades after World War II. She was born Victoria Gómez Cima. She learned to sing and play piano and guitar while still in school. She entered the Conservatorio de Liceo in Barcelona to study piano and singing, completing the six-year program in three, and graduating with full honors at the age of 18. Her membership in the Conservatory's Ars Musicae gave her wide exposure to the art song repertory and Baroque and Renaissance music.

… Arax Mansourian's recordings of medieval Armenian chants are an important part of the treasure vault of Armenian music. In the 1990's, during a liturgical festival, she toured 14 cities in France with an all male Armenian choir. French Armenian artist Garzou said …….“Arax Mansourian was divine in Yekmalian's liturgy. As if she wasn't a singer but virgin Mary herself, so impressive and powerful was her singing…”

Sony Classical announces the upcoming release of Verissimo, the new album by internationally celebrated Italian tenor Vittorio Grigòlo. His countless admirers have eagerly awaited the repertoire he performs in this program, which includes many of the most popular tenor arias in Italian opera. Grigòlo is joined by distinguished conductor Pier Giorgio Morandi and the Czech National Symphony Orchestra.

EMI's 50 Best Romantic Classics is loosely organized by regions, with the first disc devoted to French music, the second to Scandinavian and Eastern European classics, and the third to music from Italy and Spain. This arrangement is quite practical for beginners, who may appreciate the music's recognizable national styles before grasping more historical or theoretical aspects. Yet some understanding is needed of the term romantic, for not all of the music included in this collection fits within the Romantic era (roughly, the 19th century, with some overlapping of the early years of the 20th).