Karima Parry

Parry’s 1888 oratorio on the Apocryphal tale of an avenging Jewish widow emerges as a worthy successor to Mendelssohn’s Elijah in this gripping world premiere recording with Sarah Fox, Kathryn Rudge and Toby Spence.

Although it was Donizetti’s first theatrical success, the original 1822 version of this violent love story was never given a complete performance because the tenor cast in the role of the hero died shortly before the first night. Even so, Donizetti quickly adapted this role for a mezzo-soprano, achieving his first theatrical success. Opera Rara presents the world premiere of the original tenor version. In addition the recording includes six more pieces written for the 1824 revival.

Opera Rara recorded the new critical edition by the Rossini Foundation of Otello. Hugely admired in its day, this highly innovative score contains some of Rossini’s most inspired music. The recording includes the reconstruction of the alternative happy ending (written for Rome in 1820) as well as an aria for Desdemona which the great Giudetta Pasta sang to acclaim in Paris and London.

La straniera was Bellini’s fourth opera, first performed at La Scala in February 1829. During the composer’s lifetime, and for a few years after his death in 1835, it enjoyed considerable international success, though contemporary reviewers were sometimes hostile, criticising its lack of set-piece arias and complaining of the “continual interruptions” to the musical line. It is this that strikes the modern listener as one of the most interesting aspects of the score.

Giovanni Mayr is known today primarily as the teacher of Donizetti, but in the very late 1700s and first two decades of the 1800s, this German-born, Italian-by-adoption composer was all the operatic rage, combining the fiorature and niceties of Italian vocal writing with a German penchant for orchestration (Medea’s opening aria has a violin obbligato of the type that you simply do not find with the Italians, for instance). Medea in Corinto is considered Mayr’s masterpiece; in fact, it’s a long score, not quite as poweful as Cherubini’s, but with plenty of flavor of its own.

This new recording by Gävle Symphony Orchestra with conductor Jaime Martín is a tribute to the work of Johannes Brahms (18331897). The art of Brahms has inspired countless of artists and composers since the 19th century up to our times. Arnold Schoenberg was one of the composers who greatly admired Brahms work. Schoenberg was particularly fond of Brahms 1st Piano Quartet (Op. 25) and when Otto Klemperer suggested him to orchestrate it in 1937, Schoenberg took the task without hesitation. Schoenberg regarded his reworking of the Piano Quartet often dubbed as Brahms Fifth as an act of homage to Brahms, and he believed he had finally succeeded in addressing the composers concerns about the original score. No wonder that Schoenbergs masterful arrangement has remained in the concert programs of symphony orchestras.

Parry was indebted to the grand Romantic tradition of the late nineteenth century, and his colourful and exuberant concerto probably lays claim to be the first British piece written in such a style worthy of comparison with contemporary continental models. It is a virtuoso work, extrovertly conceived for piano and undoubtedly written for the technical proficiency of Edward Dannreuther, one of the most important exponents of the grand concerto style in London during the 1870s and 1880s.

The "100 Years of Italian Opera" series released by Opera Rara is unique in the annals of opera recordings. However, this installment is especially exciting as it documents the evolution of Italian opera during the 1820's, the decade when romanticism truly began to come into its own on the operatic stage. Opera Rara has lovingly compiled a variety of arcana written by composers famous and forgotten. Included is everything from overtures to arias, duets, ensembles, and entire scenes.